Orientalist Fantasy Settings

[GreatGreyShrike]

It's going to be non-trivial distinguish that sort of thing. There are costs and benefits from trying to distinguish the ascetic wilderness flavour of monk (e.g. Yamabushi) from more monastary-centric groups on a mechanical level.

Your eastern fantasy probably should be able to support Benkei (or rather a Benkei expy) as a character, IMO. Benkei starts out in Buddhist monastaries, and then later goes to become a mountain ascetic, then becomes a wandering warrior. If you want to distinguish between the two types of monk on a mechanical level like d20 class, Benkei multiclasses. If you don't, maybe he selects some Monastary Monk abilities / features early on and then picks up wilderness ascetic monk class features later on.

This should be the sort of thing a player can do as the campaign progresses - you should be able to wander around and maybe join a different group and start learning their abilities on top of whatever you do. A lot of characters tend to start out one thing and then progress to others later in their career. This is tough to make work well in d20 class-based, so something more point-based is possibly better suited to this particular character.

(Also, Benkei is a definite argument in favour of the players being able to have multiple weapons used proficiently at no or at least very low cost compared to one weapon - he famously walked around with basically a golf bag worth of weapons, carrying a sword and "a broad axe (masakari), a rake (kumade), a sickle (nagigama), a wooden mallet (hizuchi), a saw (nokogiri), an iron staff (tetsubō), and a Japanese glaive (naginata)." If each of those weapons takes up a significant portion of his character's points, no-one will ever be able to play a character like that without dragging the group down)[/i]

[OgreBattle]

The rake and carpenters saw, I wonder what specific symbolic value was had with them

[Whipstitch]

the Samurai probably needs to be able to take 3x as many hits as the geisha, making him great at fighting mobs

I know you're speaking a bit off the cuff here but now is as good a time as any to bring up that I don't really think Samurai should be a class at all. Or, to put it more plainly, samurai, knight or some other equivalent should remain a social rank for people who are at least nominally warriors by caste or promotion.

I say this because we should want "samurai" who are the best duelists, samurai who are the best horseman, samurai who are the best heavy infantry and "samurai" who are actually tricksy bureaucrats who get stomped out when they can't sleaze their way out a dramatic final duel. What you don't want is all of those things to be shoehorned into one class, particularly since there's going to be a lot of people who want "is a bad ass with a katana" stapled onto their build. It's just way easier to share spotlight in a "Seven Samurai" scenario if most of the "samurai" don't actually share the same fuckin' class.

[Username17]

the Samurai probably needs to be able to take 3x as many hits as the geisha, making him great at fighting mobs

I know you're speaking a bit off the cuff here but now is as good a time as any to bring up that I don't really think Samurai should be a class at all. Or, to put it more plainly, samurai, knight or some other equivalent should remain a social rank for people who are at least nominally warriors by caste or promotion.

I say this because we should want "samurai" who are the best duelists, samurai who are the best horseman, samurai who are the best heavy infantry and "samurai" who are actually tricksy bureaucrats who get stomped out when they can't sleaze their way out a dramatic final duel. What you don't want is all of those things to be shoehorned into one class, particularly since there's going to be a lot of people who want "is a bad ass with a katana" stapled onto their build. It's just way easier to share spotlight in a "Seven Samurai" scenario if most of the "samurai" don't actually share the same fuckin' class.

This argument makes much more sense in low fantasy than it does in high fantasy. In Seven Samurai or Lone Wolf and Cub, basically all the protagonist characters are Samurai and it's important to distinguish them. In a high fantasy Orientalist cooperative storytelling game, our typical 4-person party is:

• Samurai
• Ninja
• Monk
• Sorcerer

And at that point, we're not so much looking for ways to differentiate our different Samurai, because we only have the one. Instead, we're looking to keep the one Samurai having enough to do that he doesn't feel small in the pants next to the Sorcerer and Monk.

-Username17

[Ancient History]

Which gets weird when classes like "Samurai" or "Knight" can double as a distinction of social rank as much as martial ability and focus - something else to keep in mind.

[Chamomile]

On the one hand, it is very common for people to assume that playing the "Noble" class in Star Wars requires a contrived explanation for why your small business owner or guy who want to college is also a distant cousin to Princess Leia and therefore literally a noble. On the other hand, Petals and Thorns has knightly orders who are full of rangers and wizards and nobody seemed particularly confused that someone named "Sir Brennec" holds the rank of knight and also wears light armor and shoots a bow.

[Whipstitch]

Which gets weird when classes like "Samurai" or "Knight" can double as a distinction of social rank as much as martial ability and focus - something else to keep in mind.

That distinction is what I'm most worried about, yes. The term doesn't have to be samurai but whatever it is I think it should be nailed down pretty early because I'd expect it to flavor a lot of expectations. I'm pretty skeptical that you can throw down a game with these themes and not routinely come away with two flavors of Toshiro Mifune.

[Grek]

L5R uses 'Samurai' for the social rank and 'Bushi' for being trained fight people with weapons and armour. Bushi implies Bushido, which is probably too intertwined with real world history and religion, but a similar term could and probably should be devised.

[Username17]

The Japanese term for Warrior that doesn't have specific real-world philosophical connotations is "Senshi." In America, that word is associated with Sailor Moon, which I think is a plus.

-Username17

[OgreBattle]

in a class system where the setting ibcludes Malays and Mongols, do you use samurai and monk as universal classes or does every one have their own ‘prestige class’

I figure a skill based system would be good, especially if characters are expected to travel and go from esoteric monk to pirate to samurai warlord and so on.

Shadowrun’s magic being spirit, self, or item based is versatile across myriad cultural magic users

[Ancient History]

Shadowrun had to walk the line between D&D-style combat magic and real-world style ritual sorcery. Because no existing culture has a spell for casting fireballs at your enemy.

And there's something to be said for the basic conceit that they came up with: every culture's magic is equally both right and wrong. The "Hermetic" and "Shaman" traditions et al. bear some aesthetic similarities to real-world magical and religious practices, but they largely do things that not only can real-world practitioners not do, but which operate in ways completely outside their paradigm...and that's okay. It's better for everybody to be wrong than for one group of white people to have gotten it right while everybody else got it wrong.

[OgreBattle]

I know in the Koei games the Yellow Turban boss had weather magic, I forget if he can throw fire or lightning

[Username17]

I know in the Koei games the Yellow Turban boss had weather magic, I forget if he can throw fire or lightning

In Dynasty Warriors, Zhang Jue can make explosions of fire with his Taoist magic. But the point is that this is a post-Gygaxian interpretation, not a historical or traditional one.

Once we put sorcerers into a game, they need to have sorcery that interacts with the parameters of that game. If the game is otherwise about warriors stabbing fools in the face, then sorcery needs spells that operate on that time scale and contribute in that arena. It's why sorcery in Shadowrun is considerably more powerful than it is in Earthdawn, with the fire blasts hitting harder, going farther, and crucially being cast considerably more quickly.

In most cultural traditions, magic is generally something that takes a lot longer and is a lot less equivalent to smacking people with a war hammer. But in a game where the characters smack people with warhammers, that distinction isn't generally workable. Hence, most games end up distinguishing between combat time spellcasting and ritual magic. That's a distinction that doesn't really exist in any traditional context, because flashy "combat magic" obviously doesn't exist.

But of course, you're definitely going to want to lean in to this idea in your Orientalist Fantasy RPG, because the Samurai, the Ninja, and the Monk are all hitting people with sticks and your Sorcerer needs magic that operates on that time scale.

-Username17

[deaddmwalking]

You may want combat time scale magic, but I don't think you've actually made a case for it. There are a lot of 'ritual magic' effects you could potentially have when you walk into a fight. If gaining the strength of 10 men and invulnerability to blades takes 20 minutes to cast, that doesn't preclude having it available when the combat music starts.

There is support for sorcerers who are powerful when prepared, but they die as quick as any other fool if they're surprised.

[Omegonthesane]

Having been on a Cultist Simulator kick lately my first thought is that it's just sort of assumed that Sorcerers have a summoned horrible thing lying around that tags out for them in combat. Because sorcerers having class-defining spells that make them have the benefit of a martial training regimen makes them overlap too much with monks for this stage of the design process.

Also a perennial source of consternation at my old larp society was the fact that the rules supported PCs who got up and did a bunch of rituals in order to have spells running on them with a duration of "The whole session", which would cost far more XP to be able to cast in combat time - the Old Guard(tm) hated the idea that people ought to be able to do things the morning before game start.

[maglag]

In most cultural traditions, magic is generally something that takes a lot longer and is a lot less equivalent to smacking people with a war hammer. But in a game where the characters smack people with warhammers, that distinction isn't generally workable. Hence, most games end up distinguishing between combat time spellcasting and ritual magic. That's a distinction that doesn't really exist in any traditional context, because flashy "combat magic" obviously doesn't exist.

Moises sees the Pharaoh approaching with an army of war chariots and routs the crap out of it with quite flashy Flame Strike before they can close in. Rocket tag magic already supported in the old edition!

Monkey King had no blasting, but he had plenty of other flashy combat magic like making clones of himself.

[Whipstitch]

I feel like RPG threat assessment is hard enough without having prepared covert effects being the standard. Obviously in a setting with monks and ninjas you're going to have a non-zero number of covert super powers and unassuming bad asses, but it can get a bit tiresome if you don't mix it up a bit and have many threats be about as subtle as the Juggernaut.

[OgreBattle]

I've been curious as to mythical sources for blaster magic, as a lot seems to be modern wargaming stuff.
This article say a wargame Gygax played had Tolkien wizards take the place of catapults and guns
https://www.gamasutra.com/view/news/271 ... _games.php
catapult= fireball, gun= lightning bolt


There's a lost 1920's wuxia film Burning of the Red Lotus Temple, one of the promo images shows dudes shooting lightning from their hands:


Another image shows telekinetic blades:


Don't know what specific literature or myth this film draws from, but the director lived in Japan and may have been influenced by the ninja films being made there.

Like the tale of Gallant Jiraiya:
https://vintageninja.net/monster-vs-nin ... n-jiraiya/

Monster transformation is prominent in that film adaption of a folk tale based on some older concepts.

Here's Jiraiya doing a hand sign to perform water magic that traps his foes

I think it's based on https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kuji-kiri

'Blasting magic' can simply be the use of gunpowder or a magic-equivalent of gunpowder too. Like in some artwork Jiraiya uses a giant gun to fight Orochimaru https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/ ... den_12.jpg

[JigokuBosatsu]

Speaking as both a Buddhist and former priest, Buddhism is pretty good for fiction because the sects vary widely in tone and practice, and national variants are pretty distinct. You've got your esoteric schools, your traditionalist forest hermits, your ornate golden lamas with a wild pantheon of gods, your koan-yelling masters, and more besides. There's also a flexibility baked into the religion itself- most Buddhists are pretty chill with you making your own interpretation.

The solution I found for gaming and fiction was a religion based around "The Wheelman" which is about as serial-numbers-filed-off as you get, but still respecting the tradition itself, as aniconism was a big thing at various points and some depictions of the Tathagatha were notable in their absence of depiction. So you can make this fantasy Buddhism whatever you want, as in-world nobody can agree on whether The Wheelman was a teacher or a god, and what exactly the faith was supposed to be outside of some basic tenets.

I won't speak for whether specific cultural practices are fair game, but as far as Buddhism itself, go nuts.

[Iduno]

Speaking as both a Buddhist and former priest, Buddhism is pretty good for fiction because the sects vary widely in tone and practice, and national variants are pretty distinct. You've got your esoteric schools, your traditionalist forest hermits, your ornate golden lamas with a wild pantheon of gods, your koan-yelling masters, and more besides. There's also a flexibility baked into the religion itself- most Buddhists are pretty chill with you making your own interpretation.

I assume part of that is, if they fully understood the correct interpretation, they would transcend this world. So if you're speaking to them, 1) they're slightly imperfect and understand you are as well and 2) judgement isn't exactly conducive to perfection. As long as you're making your interpretation in a respectful way, they've got no reason to care.

[Longes]

There's plenty of non-ritual magic in historical folklore.

Sir Kay from the Arthurian myth threw fireballs at people.

Simon the Sorcerer would fly around Rome until Apostle Peter counterspelled him. Christian saints in general would do all sorts of non-ritual magic, like teleporting, commanding animals, and using sunbeams as coathangers.

Circe turned people into pigs with her magic wand.

Odin is technically a god and using them is unfair, but since he's the archetipal magician by way of Gandalf, I think he's worth mentioning. Odin, after learning magic, would engage in shapeshifting and necromancy.

Vasilisa the Wise shapeshifts herself and her husband into different forms, and transforms things into other things (like a hankerchief into a lake and a hairbrush into a forest).

Soumaoro Kanté flies and casts Charm Person on people, becoming a witch-king.

Buddhists and yogis got magic powers from their spiritual development, and generally didn't need any rituals to use them. That's how Sun Wukong got his.

Spellcasters are comparatively rare in mythology/folklore, but that happens because the role of a wizard in a classic story is to act as a donor, empowering the protagonist to achieve the heroic feat. That's why you see wizards handing out enchanted items much more than going out and casting a death curse on someone.

There's also a meaningful difference between magicians in folklore, and magical traditions people practiced. The latter includes mostly ritualistic divinations, curses and blessings because immediate direct magic is clearly falsifiable. Though things like the Evil Eye (non-ritual curses) are also omnipresent. But folklore does feature non-ritual magicians, and that's probably what's worth emulating more.

[JigokuBosatsu]

I assume part of that is, if they fully understood the correct interpretation, they would transcend this world. So if you're speaking to them, 1) they're slightly imperfect and understand you are as well and 2) judgement isn't exactly conducive to perfection. As long as you're making your interpretation in a respectful way, they've got no reason to care.

Kind of? It really depends on what kind of Buddhism you subscribe to.

Speaking to the magic bits later in the thread, there's also plenty of inspiration for magic and superpowers for a fantasy Buddhism: Buddha's polymorph battles with Mara, the demigod shenanigans of the bodhisattvas, zenjoriki (one of the things Ninjas & Superspies got right) etc. You've got the original "train so hard you become invincible and telekinetic" powers from qigong, and hell- Milarepa was a legit evil sorceror killing people with death magic, and even straight up built a wizard tower.

Generally these superpowers are acknowledged but dismissed. The Buddha even specifically called out making a superpower tier list as an unhealthy practice.

[deaddmwalking]

Personally, I think that giving sorcerers spells that they can use in combat time is the right choice. It's certainly easier to make sure that they have something to contribute if they can access their spells in roughly the time it takes to draw and use a sword.

But it certainly isn't the only option available. One reason people will accept that warriors are viable is if they're really good at killing wizards. If you want warriors to be good at killing wizards, reducing the options a wizard has in combat time is one option you have.

Alternatively, you can make sure that both warriors and wizards have combat-time spells, and blur the distinction between them. There's no reason that a warrior can't have his ancestor's spirits guiding his blade in terms of attack abilities or guiding him like Inigo Montoya to the hidden torture chamber - or shooting lightning.

I think you need to choose which option you want to support, and it has consequences for the setting no matter which way you choose. So choosing early and being consistent is important.

[kzt]

I can buy that a clan is something that you personally identify with, and your aunts, uncles, cousins, etc are all members of your clan. But if you're from Heilongjiang and you find yourself in Yunnan, I would expect regional differences to trump clan affiliation. If it doesn't, I think you need to at least explain why having a common ancestor 1000 years ago means you can expect a warmer relationship than their neighbor of 20 years who happens to be a different clan.

If it's cultural, it's not part of any real world culture. It deserves explanation.

If its cultural, one also has to consider people inside and outside the clan structure. If Marco Polo shows up, does he have 'people' status without a clan?

The old Arab saying applies "against my brother, my brothers and I against my cousins, then my cousins and I against strangers."

Family, clan and tribal loyalties are everything in most premodern cultures. And some places are still like that. Afghanistan is a place on a map, not something most of the inhabitants owe loyalty to. They are loyal to their family, clan and tribe, in that order. This also has a lot to do with the endemic corruption and nepotism in a lot of cultures.

If you are a stranger then it depends on culture and how they greet you. Obligations to a guest are enormous in some cultures. Or they could kill you for your boots, as you are stranger and nobody is going to care.

[Username17]

As we can see from Lord of the Rings and Star Wars, it's not unreasonable for a fantasy setting to have sorcerers go into battle swinging swords around. However, the key thing to consider is that in a cooperative storytelling game, the characters are going to interact with the minigames and the players want their character to do so in a manner that makes their archetype choice matter.

Which is to say that the player chooses to play a Sorcerer instead of playing a Ninja or a Senshi, and when the combat music starts that decision should matter. The player should interact with the combat mini-game in a manner where their choice to be a Sorcerer makes them different from a Monk or Samurai or whatever other archetype is available in game.

For a game that spends sufficient time outside of combat, that genuinely could mean "Sorcerers are bad at combat." But I suspect that few Orientalist Fantasy RPGs are going to want to deliver that even if it's something they could reliably do. Which means instead that it is most likely that you'll want to design your combat system with an expectable role for the Sorcerers and make combat magic for the Sorcerers to us to fill that role.

-Username17