Indian Campaign, Details?

[virgil]

Aside from aesthetics, what are some major differences between your generic faux-medieval campaign and doing one set in medieval/ancient India, especially in urban areas? I'm trying to find information on Indian culture, but it's not terribly informative.

[Maxus]

Caste system is a big one. I forget the exact rankings, but I remember it went like "Brahmin" --> Warrior --> Forget a couple of steps, and then at the very bottom you have the untouchables, the casteless, who do stuff like cremate the dead and if you touch one of them, you become one of them.

The brahmin were technically the higher caste, but the nobles/warriors seemed to actually administer.

If you can, try to find The Iron Ring by Lloyd Alexander. Good take on medieval Indian fantasy.

[fectin]

Siddhartha is pretty worthwhile, both for culture and for your own edification.

I would read Lord of Light, and base it on that.

[OgreBattle]

Aside from aesthetics, what are some major differences between your generic faux-medieval campaign and doing one set in medieval/ancient India, especially in urban areas? I'm trying to find information on Indian culture, but it's not terribly informative.

Heard from an Indian that the book "The Wonder that was India" was a common introductory piece to Indian history in universities http://www.flipkart.com/wonder-india-3r ... 23fgvrk677

'The Discovery of India' was written by India's future first prime minister Nehru when he was imprisoned by Britain for his involvement in the independence movement:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Discovery_of_India

This Q&A website has a lot of Indians answering questions on everything India related. If you want I can ask specific questions for you. Like say the Caste system:

http://www.quora.com/Indian-Caste-Syste ... es-it-work

http://www.quora.com/What-is-the-histor ... South-Asia

The Indian caste system can be equated to the feudal social model of Europe in the medieval ages. There was a nobility (including royalty), the clergy attached to the church, a community of craftsmen's guilds and traders and finally, the general lay peasantry. The original caste system of India was identical, and to the extent it still persists, it has the same basic structure.

The uppermost caste was the priests or the brahmins. They were followed by the warrior caste (kshatriyas), from which the rulers of the states usually came. Then was the trader class (vaisyas), followed by the peasantry (sudras). Originally the caste system was flexible and based on actual vocation, But soon it hardened into fixed hereditary categories.

-Som Bhatta

Then you can see some more Indians arguing in the comments section over specifics.



If you want info on Indian mythological stuff check out
http://www.quora.com/Mahabharata/What-a ... ahabharata

Like nifty magic arrows:

Barbarik was the grandson of Bhima and the son of Ghatotkacha. Barbarik was supposed to be a brave warrior having learnt the art of warfare from his mother. Lord Shiva pleased with Barbarik's talent as a warrior granted him a Three special arrows. He also got a special bow from Lord Agni (God of Fire).


To this Barbarik explained the power of the 3 arrows.
-The first arrow was supposed to mark all the objects that Barbarik wanted to be destroyed.
-The second arrow was supposed to mark all the objects that Barbarik wanted to be saved.
-The third arrow was supposed to destroy all the objects marked by the first arrow OR destroy all the objects not marked by the second arrow.

And at the end of this all the arrows would come return to the quiver. Krishna eager to test this out asked Barbarik to tie all the leaves of the tree that he was standing under. As Barbarik started meditating to perform the task, Krishna took one leaf from the tree and placed it under his foot without Barbarik's knowledge. When Barbarik releases the first arrow, the arrow marks all the leaves from the tree and eventually starts revolving around Lord Krishna's feet. Krishna asks Barbarik as to why the arrow is doing this. To this Barbarik replies that there must be a leaf under your feet and asks Krishna to lift his leg. As soon as Krishna lifts his leg, the arrow goes ahead and marks the remaining leaf too.

You could have a whole campaign around trying to get all 3 of these arrows together, and then you don't know which arrow is which.

[AndreiChekov]

The untouchables did not burn the dead. That was a holy job. A task of the Brahmen actually.

In india, even those who are not hindu have a caste system.
Within the Christians there, there is a caste system.

In general though, Karma is a big thing, but it is not the typical western view of Karma. One must follow the helping of other people, but if something bad happens to someone, it is because they have bad karma, and you don't want to catch that bad karma, so you don't touch them.

The lower castes are completely accepted because they have their role in society, but you wouldn't make friends with them.

I tried doing an Indian campaign once, but it fell flat because it was difficult to have PCs from different castes that would actually interact with each other, so if they are all the same caste (make up your own with an "adventuring" caste) then it works well enough.

I don't know what sort of mythical creatures they had. Their religion makes dancing a big deal, so adding something about that can make it seem more authentic.
Also a big thing is the temples of cultists Indiana Jones style. That is not accurate, but it makes sense if you are white.

Are you looking for authentic or the feeling from a western perspective?

[Josh_Kablack]

You could also go to primary sources, like this gem from the year of 1475

Hindus address their bulls as father, and their cows as mother. They bake bread and prepare their food over dung fires, and mark their faces and foreheads and entire bodies with the ash. On Sundays and Mondays, Hindus eat only once in a day. In India, there are many unattached women, and that is why they are cheap: if you have intimate relations with her, give her two copper coins; if you want to throw your money to the winds, give her six. And there you have it. Slave-concubines are cheap: four coins for a good one; five coins if she is black and lovely, a dark jewel, small and good.

Linky

[virgil]

Are you looking for authentic or the feeling from a western perspective?

Closer to authentic. If everyone dressed as if they were white and used white people names/words, the social norms and political structure would be recognizable to the educated as medieval/ancient Indian. Technically, it would be fantasy/non-Indian rather than white clothing and names; but I'm writing it and white.

[AndreiChekov]

For authentic indian, religion is a big deal. Killing things is definitely wrong, because you could be killing a reincarnated ancestor. Unless you are killing a human, because humans are the lowest life form, and so, none of your ancestors were reincarnated as a human, right?

The Yoga Temples were originally places where people trained for war. So, there is a lot of discipline and training involved with warriors.

I can only tell you how the society is like though. I don't know the mythology, or their fairy tales. (fairy tales isn't really the right word here, though)

Orphans are basically worthless. The sins of their parents make them how they are, and as such, slum dog millionaire is completely accurate in showing the ones blinded to make more money as beggars, and the girl forced into prostitution.

The Casteless are actually wanted by farmers, because they eat rats. So farmers don't run them off like everyon eelse does.

[virgil]

How prevalent is vegetarianism in ye olde India? How mobile are people; as in, can a bloke just decide to walk for a few weeks and enter a new village/city as a stranger and pick up his vocation (or lie about his caste and pick up a new one)? How involved is law enforcement, whatever form said law takes? How much conflict is there between Hinduism and Buddhism or the other religions? How different is a 'kingdom' dominated by one particular religion compared to the others? What is the situation like for organized crime and banditry, as compared to the stereotypical one in euro-centric stories?

[AndreiChekov]

How prevalent is vegetarianism in ye olde India? How mobile are people; as in, can a bloke just decide to walk for a few weeks and enter a new village/city as a stranger and pick up his vocation (or lie about his caste and pick up a new one)? How involved is law enforcement, whatever form said law takes? How much conflict is there between Hinduism and Buddhism or the other religions? How different is a 'kingdom' dominated by one particular religion compared to the others? What is the situation like for organized crime and banditry, as compared to the stereotypical one in euro-centric stories?

1. everyone is vegan. The law made it so, and breaking it was a death penalty. hence the wars between muslims and hindus

2. There are no horse drawn carriages or stuff like that. The very rich travel by elephant. I suppose if you traveled a few hundred miles you could lie about your caste, but skin colour had a lot to do with it, so you couldn't lie that much. The higher the caste, the lighter the skin.

3. Law enforcement is a bit like the wild west. You form a posse when someone does something wrong. But before that you take a petition to a the local maharaja.

4. Hinduism used to require killing everyone else because they broke all the rules. they are much nicer these days. Buddhism, although it started in India, is actually almost non existent there, and is in predominant in Burma, Nepal, and various oriental countries.

5. I can't describe the differences in religion in one post. Just read the wikipedia entries on each one. They are accurate enough. Remember that the religions have become nicer in the last couple hundred years (as all religions have).

6. I don't know about organized crime. I would suspect that it was run by nobility, but that is based on the amount of wealth they have/had, not any actual fact.

[Scrivener]

1. everyone is vegan. The law made it so, and breaking it was a death penalty. hence the wars between muslims and hindus

What? You mean to say that ghee was illegal. The whole reason the cow is sacred in India has to do with milk. Yogis and the religious were vegetarians, and still are, but veganism isn't really a thing in India. Also, I can find no evidence of a law requiring vegetarianism.

2. There are no horse drawn carriages or stuff like that. The very rich travel by elephant. I suppose if you traveled a few hundred miles you could lie about your caste, but skin colour had a lot to do with it, so you couldn't lie that much. The higher the caste, the lighter the skin.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Ratha

Racism

What the heck man?

[AndreiChekov]

That is where the caste system comes from. It was racism that made it. Calling me racist for pointing that out is like calling Frank a racist because he once mentioned Jim Crow Laws were around.

Its a matter of religion, because the ancient laws were the religious rules. Hinduism being law is what makes it law.

Again, rich people.

[Scrivener]

You mistake me, I am not calling the caste system racist, I'm calling your portrayal of it racist.

Everyone was not a vegetarian, and there certainly wasn't the death penalty for using milk, and the idea that all conflict between Muslims and Hindus was due to dietary restrictions is absurd to say the least. Elephants were not the primary mode of transportation. Hinduism was not extraordinarily bloodthirsty (especially when contrasted with how other religions acted At that time). Law enforcement was not drastically different from the rest of the world.

[OgreBattle]

How prevalent is vegetarianism in ye olde India? How mobile are people; as in, can a bloke just decide to walk for a few weeks and enter a new village/city as a stranger and pick up his vocation (or lie about his caste and pick up a new one)? How involved is law enforcement, whatever form said law takes? How much conflict is there between Hinduism and Buddhism or the other religions? How different is a 'kingdom' dominated by one particular religion compared to the others? What is the situation like for organized crime and banditry, as compared to the stereotypical one in euro-centric stories?

The Indians I've talked to say vegetarianism wasn't a big deal until the last 200-300 years.


Maybe the Osprey Publishing books could help, they got a book on Mongol controlled India though.

[TheNotoriousAMP]

My biggest tips for running an Urban Indian campaign is to emphasize wealth, progress and grandeur with immense tensions lying in the background. Medieval India was basically a tale of successive waves of Persianate and then Turkic dynasties pouring in from Uzbekistan and Pakistan, setting up shop in Northern India and then successively replacing each other. And, on occasion, they take over the south for shits and giggles. In short, an Indian city should have a crunchy Turkic (not Turkish) and Persian outside with a creamy Hindu and (if going into the 1500's) increasingly Sikh center.

Within the Hindu part, you have Rajput clans who are increasingly chafing under muslim rule, while a large part of the population is increasingly turning to Islam both for social status and mobility, as well as to skimp on the tax bill. Change is a core part of this. As for Buddhism, be careful of going all peace and flowers. Just read up on Nchiren Buddhism in Japan, or the Buddhist presence in China, Buddhist sects could be extremely violent and expansionistic.

Now, this is all really Punjab (north India) centric, but the thing is Southern india is just northern india lite at the moment. Anything not under the control of the Persian (and then Turkic) dynasties in the north is under the control of sultanates who revolted against them and established their own rule. So once again, huge, tons of money in the cities and immense trade flow, and huge tensions.

So if you're running an urban campaign, I would actually read up more on Islam as well as Persian and Ottoman culture to really get a good feel for everything. Once you go out into the countryside, everything changes though. This is where Hinduism and the caste system are king. From the 1300's onward, the members of the thuggee are forming an increasingly large criminal underclass. I'd definitely read up on the Thuggee, a violent, semi religious cult of bandits and murderers, many of him passed down the title from father to son, its great for role playing. Plus, their MO was to infiltrate caravans so you can really force your player's to investigate and think.

And don't forget the colonies abroad. The middle ages are a time when Indians are expanding all throughout south Asia to the great port cities of Indonesia, Myanmar and Thailand, play this up!

[fectin]

Vegetarianism is expensive. That's a much larger factor.

[Username17]

The Indians I've talked to say vegetarianism wasn't a big deal until the last 200-300 years.

Well, they are wrong. Travelers reports of Hindu kingdoms from the 5th century CE state:

They do not breed pigs or poultry or sell any animal food.

That being said, while Ashoka the Great was personally a vegetarian, and created the first animal cruelty laws in the third century BCE, he also allowed his citizens to eat meat.

Twenty-six years after my coronation various animals were declared to be protected—parrots, mainas, aruna, ruddy geese, wild ducks, nandimukhas, gelatas, bats, queen ants, terrapins, boneless fish, vedareyaka, gangapuputaka, sankiya fish, tortoises, porcupines, squirrels, deer, bulls, okapinda, wild asses, wild pigeons, domestic pigeons and all four-footed creatures that are neither useful nor edible. Those nanny goats, ewes and sows which are with young or giving milk to their young are protected, and so are young ones less than six months old. Cocks are not to be caponized, husks hiding living beings are not to be burnt and forests are not to be burnt either without reason or to kill creatures. One animal is not to be fed to another.

So you're still actually allowed to eat four footed animals, since if you eat them they are by definition edible and therefore not under the protection of the emperor unless they are giving milk or happen to be cows or something. But the empire clearly frowned on eating meat even if it was technically allowed.

-Username17

[TheNotoriousAMP]

Vegetarianism is expensive. That's a much larger factor.

For the peasant of the time, who primarily subsisted on wheat, pulses and beans, there really wasn't that big a difference between vegetarianism and every day except a special one. Only in Northern Europe during the early middle ages (pre population expansion) or on the steppes, was meat the base or even common in a diet.

[Judging__Eagle]

Vegetarianism is expensive. That's a much larger factor.

For the peasant of the time, who primarily subsisted on wheat, pulses and beans, there really wasn't that big a difference between vegetarianism and every day except a special one. Only in Northern Europe during the early middle ages (pre population expansion) or on the steppes, was meat the base or even common in a diet.

In medieval Europa; until there were major changes in terms of balance of power; the serf castes weren't allowed to even hunt rabbits for fear that the increased nutrition would allow them to ask for their legal rights.

Robin Hood was given a double death sentence; one for killing a guy; one for killing a deer (one of the King's deer; but technically all deer were legally the kinds).

Being "allowed" to eat meat was a privilege allowed in some places, by some people. However the statement about a Polish peasant who "could remember a bit of chicken from six months ago" from Michener's "Poland" is not some sort of hyperbole.

Meat really was that scarce and infrequent in the medieval diet. Beans, lentils, barley, were what most peasant-serfs would consume.

[Cynic]

South India was most definitely not NOrth India-lite.



The Pandya, Chola and Cheran kingdoms were three Tamil kingdoms that lasted from like 600~ BCE to 1600 CE. THe tamil kingdoms were some of the few kingdoms that weren't conquered by Ashoka*. Jain culture flourished over here and they were for the most part *more* vegan rather than vegetarian. THe Pandyan kingdoms relied quite a bit on sea trade. There does seem to be some evidence that they traded all the way to Rome and back.

Two embassies were sent by the Pandyan king Augustus the first of which he received at the second is mentioned by Strabo friendship of the Romans was sought by one other Hindu prince 0 Kerobothros king of Chera or Kerala who also was a Dravidian.

Many of the Pandyan kings actually converted later on to Saivism (SHiva worship) and even went as far as to claim that they the descendants of Shiva and Parvathi. So you have God-emperor stylings that can be added to the campaign.

FOr some mythical logistics, the Mahabharata has parts about how the Pandyan kings came to help the Pandavas (no relation) in the great war.

Steeds that were all of the hue of the Atrusa flower bore a hundred and forty thousand principle car-warriors that followed that Sarangadhwaja, the king of the Pandyas. Mahabharatha 7.23

So while the numbers might be exagerrated, it shows that not only were there cavalry but also higher echelon warriors/leaders who rode chariots. The strange translation of car-warriors seems to actually be talking about a chariot. I'm comparing it with my hindi Mahabharata and the word seems to be ratha -- which is translatable into chariot. So this is another point against AndreiChekov's idea that there were no chariots.
---

Going away from Southern India, looking at the two major mythic epics -- "THe Mahabharata" and The Ramayana", you have a lot of stuff on the differences in caste. Both of these books totally are all about lustful Gods who will take any opportunity to impregnate women and come down as Avatars. The Asuras in the books range in size from miniscule to collosal++. They fit most shapes and forms and are very magical.
---

*To be truly honest, Ashoka also was bone tired by the end of one of his last battles at Kalinga where there were more than 150,000 people dead on the battlefield. Seeing all that suffering and death has been attributed as one of the major reasons he converted to Buddhism and became peaceful. This cynic would say that he probably stopped his conquerration (totally a word now) because his troops were exhausted and he had lost a great number of them and restoring the Kalinga kingdom after taking it over also wiped out his resources. But that's a whole other story.

[Laertes]

If I was doing a game set in India it would happen earlier than most of this thread is talking. Much earlier. Specifically, I would set it in the Vedic period, with waves of Aryan invaders migrating first into the Indus valley and then the Ganges valley, displacing the Dravidian inhabitants and driving them southwards. The rise of Vedic culture within India, and the proto-Hinduism that they practised, is a wonderfully RPGable thing because you have:
- Small kingdoms
- Vast wilderness
- Two civilised cultures, each of which sees the other as orcs
- Genuine murderhobo-style raiders
- Little enough law that kings will seriously hire adventurers to solve their issues and/or fight other small bands of adventurers
- The chance to found new villages and see them grow into towns in a way that's deeply satisfying
- Greyhawk style "clear this valley of every living thing" crawls for both sides

The downside is that a lot of the Indian stuff we think of when we think of India hasn't yet come about. But this is possibly a good thing, because it means that xenographic dazzle isn't a thing.