Grandiloquence
Before we dive into the daily discussion, can we talk for a minute about Wizard’s fabulous ensemble? The dude is rocking some vintage Ron Wealsey formal robes. Kind of makes you wonder how elven fashion works. Do they just pick a decade and stick with it? Are there bell bottom robes out there somewhere?
And speaking of fashion, where did Thief get a sequin dress? Those things can’t be common in pre-industrial… Huh. Apparently that one gets a pass. I’m sure King Tut looked amazing.
Any dang way, let’s get to the actual subject of today’s comic. When you’re trying to improvise pseudo ye olde speech, it’s easy to go overboard. It’s a struggle to come up with an authentic sounding Lord of the Rings style patois, and I know that I’ve spent my share of gaming sessions wincing at my own bad dialogue. The phrase, “Allow myself to introduce myself,” looms large in my personal cringe file. But once you’ve gamed for a few years and actually have a chance of putting together a decent Shakespearean insult, you still have to learn when to turn that mess off. If you’ve ever endured your buddies’ mockery for telling the princess that, “By morning you will again sup the sweet air of freedom,” then you know what I’m talking about. Not every scene needs high words and grand speeches. As our pal Wizard found out on his fancy dinner date, that’s easier said than done.
How about the rest of your guys? Do you find yourself struggling to sound ye olde? Or conversely, have you ever found yourself overdoing it? Any tips or tricks for the rest of us? Let’s hear it in the comments!
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A little anecdote: Andrzej Sapkowski (that’s the author of the Witcher Saga, you heathens), was once criticized for refusing to use such “old-timey-sounding” language in his fantasy writing. He responded by pointing out that the polish word for a king, “król”, is derived from the name of Charlemagne, and as such would be an “anachronism” in any setting were that ruler never existed. Yet noone ever complains about the usage of the word. This is also how I see things. When we say something IC, it is assumed our characters are actually speaking in their native tongue, as opposed to literally transcribing every sound we made. I see no reason why the same logic can’t be extended to ye olde style of talking.
I think there’s a very good reason why we choose these affected-sounding words. Language is metaphorical and referential to a larger extent than “król” and Charlemagne. The Consigliere rogue archetype from Paizo for example, paladins sharing similar Charlemagne associations, or even orcs not existing outside of Tolkien all point towards a fantasy mishmash. We’ve accepted these things not because they’re etymologically accurate, but because they evoke fantasy genre associations in the reader. It’s the same reason The Faerie Queene is written like it is. That arcane language was Spencer’s attempt to evoke a ye olde feel in his readers.
You can imagine that the players speaking with modern English slang is only a loose translation of the foreign words actually spoken by the characters, but it still won’t evoke the same feel around the table.
I suppose that’s a matter of expectations. I was raised on the aforementioned Witcher books. To me, it feels perfectly natural that almost everyone save some peasants is speaking in modern dialect, wizards argue about genetics, and the only “ye olde” word that pops up reasonably often is a slur for the part of the body where person’s back looses it’s proud title.
Expectation is exactly the word for it. I haven’t read The Witcher books, but it sounds to me like Sapkowski is breaking from genre convention to achieve a particular effect. That’s still breaking from convention though, and it will “sound wrong” to some people. Finding that balance between “these words wouldn’t make sense in my world” and “everyone talks like they’re from LA” is not an easy one. Especially when you’ve got to improvise in an RPG rather than write and edit a novel.
Interesting. The same logic would disqualify the word for emperor in most European languages (English, Greek and the romance langauages are the exception), where it is derived from “Ceasar”.
I avoid most of the flowery Olde English and instead try to get the setting-specific language correct. Colorful exclamations are the most important.
“Oh my God” -> “Trickster’s toes!” (or other Deity-specific exclamation)
“What the Hell?” -> “What in the Hells?”
etc.
If I want to get really fancy with it, i’ll pull up the ol’ Candlekeep Elven dictionary when coming up with Elven names.
Speaketh in ye olde English, however? Verily, nary a soul hath timeth f’r yond.
Methinks I should have been careful in my description of the language I’m trying to describe. When I say “ye olde,” I’m imagining the pseudo ye olde of the Lord of the Rings films or the Game of Thrones TV series. Actually attempting Elizabethan is not my jam.
But as for exclamations, I think you and I have talked before about writing stuff down outside of game…? I find that if I don’t do so, I’ll slip back into surprised characters shouting, “Jesus Christ!” Cue the rest of the still in-character party being like, “Who?”
It’s hard to remember at this point. =)
I think so, though. If not, I very much agree. I keep reference documents for most of my characters for their phrases, mannerisms, expressions, prayers, etc.
I’ll have to turn this into a comic at some point. Maybe it’s time to give Barbarian another panel and trot out my list ‘o barbarian superstitions….
Personally I rely on “translation convention” for this kind of stuff. When my kobold bard is talking to the gold dragon in draconic, I’m speaking normal English and it’s understood it’s draconic. Similarly, common is not English, so I just speak normally with the understanding it’s “translated” into common. The downside is this makes puns much harder to justify IC.
I have two exceptions to this. One is exclamations, where I 0refer to use setting appropriate ones both for immersion (e.g. “Oh my gods!”) and because they’re funny (e.g. “By Kord’s well-oiled nipples!”). The other is when a character is speaking an old or foreign dialect of a common tongue. If my players find ancient dwarven runes with old dwarf writing, I’ll render it in ye olde butchered English to indicate theit age and how it would sound to modern dwarven speakers.
Well then. I’m stealing the crap out of, “By Kord’s well-oiled nipples!”
Some of my thoughts on “translation convention” are in my reply to HadACookie up above. I’d love to hear you weigh in there. 🙂
Fine by me, go ahead and steal that completely original expletive that I absolutely did not steal from DM of the Rings*
In regards to translation convention, I’m gonna second what HadACookie said about expectations. If you go in expecting Tolkien-esque setting, then when the ranger boasts that she’s totally gonna curbstomp those orcs it’s gonna sound wrong. My biggest problem with doing the more flowery dialogue all the time is that when you make a character who is naturally, shall we say, dramatically verbose, or speech patterns stuck in the past, it makes it much harder to do. My Cha 20 In 14 bard should talk differently than that Int 8 Cha 6 half-orc, who should talk differently from the Int 20 Cha 8 wizard. If the barbarian is speaking in Shakespearean prose, how does my bard distinguish himself?
On a final note, imho people who try to do the flowery dialogue and bumbling through it breaks immersion more than just talking normally**, because then not only does it sounds wrong to everyone and you’re trying not to laugh at it
*the comic I definitely did not steal it from: http://www.shamusyoung.com/twentysidedtale/?p=1313&cpage=2
**”Oh man, sucks to be you.” “Oh come on, I know you can do better than that.” “Hark, thy fate sucketh?” “That is…much worse.”***
***This line also certainly not stolen from DMotR
…as long as it flows well. One of the things George R. R. Martin did well is making the language in A Song of Ice and Fire sound a bit similar to early Modern English (kinda Shakespearean) without sounding too pompous.
Just add a couple of those phrases and it will sound passable. It’s better to be inconsistent than overly dramatic.
In my mind, a good example of the style is Aragorn’s, ” If by my life or death I can protect you, I will.” The phrasing is a bit archaic, but no so much that it sounds over the top.
Of course, if Aragorn were a PC, he would probably follow that up with, “So Elrond… What kind of payment are we talking about here?”
it helped that Tolkien was a philologist, who studied old writing and the origins of words and phrases. his characters spoke in old styles of literary phrasing, used terms and words little seen in mode modern times.. but he understood those old styles of speech and writing enough to make it sound natural. which is partly why so many of his imitators sound so silly, because they didn’t have that level of understanding, and end up over doing it or using the wrong styles.
I struggle tremendously avoiding ‘Jesus Christ!’ when my character is startled/angry/in need of an explicative and not the sort of person who would curse like a sailor. In Pathfinder and the like there’s not much I can do but try and discipline myself better, but in my games of Exalted where there’s a god for any and everything, Jesus Christ is in fact a small god of explicatives who receives prayer every time his name is said in vain.
Head canon accepted.
This comic actually stems from a new character of mine. I just rolled up an occultist, and I have a pretty specific character reference in mind. As such, I find myself trying to come up with pseudo-mystical malarkey to shout at monsters. Turns out it isn’t easy to improvise this kind of stuff.
Oh yes he’s my favorite character in that series.
I have to agree, he is hard to mimic.
So are you gonna go so far as to talk in the same voice?
Only in combat, but yeah. 100%
Last night’s session had a combat vs. ghouls. “That which is dead should remain dead. Return to the grave. Retuuuurn I say!”
The difficulty for me is the transition from shouting in that voice to discussing mundane things like marching order or light sources.
HA nice!
Well the obvious solution is just to stay in that voice all the time.
“YES I would like dew of the mountain!”
Wizard could have used Prestidigitation on her dress to make it sparkle.
I would say that if you are going to try and sound flowery and “in character” for the time period they come from, then make sure of two things:
1. Does your character have Common(fancy) as a language, or rather were they actually taught to speak like that?
2. Does your audience have it too?
In the interest of being accurate, it’s just as important to know that the culture or class of people you are speaking to May have their own sub dialect.
People who want to be an ass would speak that way to a commoner, but even a person of highborn upbringing would dial it back if they wanted to be on good terms with ye ol’ tavern owner… A person of sufficient upbringing would know better than most, what to say and how to say it.
Wizard has a chronic case of oblivious pros though so…
Until this moment, I had no idea how much I wanted to RP as Hedley Lamarr:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KZtQofXRSSw
“Look, dear! It’s Heady Lamarr!”
“It’s Hedley!”
With Usidor (as you’re aware) flowery speeches are the norm. With Krusk, Hulk speak work good.
I haven’t had a chance to play my Tabaxi Rogue yet, but I’m thinking he’ll be talking in the 3rd person when referencing himself. I find doing things outside the norm at the table gives it a little shake-up & gets people to actually ROLE PLAY.
I did not know what Tabaxi were. Then I Googled them:
http://vignette2.wikia.nocookie.net/forgottenrealms/images/a/a2/Tabaxi-5e.jpg/revision/latest?cb=20161125224627
Then I realized I was familiar with them after all:
https://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/en/e/ef/Marsupilami_1.jpg
The fact that you dragged Marsupalami into this has cost you EVERY complaint you will ever make against Usidor ever again. 😛
Most of my dialect selection involves figuring out ways to avoid anachronisms, with a secondary incentive to personalize things for my character. Hunter Kuu, my Tengu, would not consider a Charisma 22 Aasimar to be a ‘Total Hottie’ like the drow does and ostensibly says in character. For one thing, too few feathers by far even if she does have wings on her shoulders.
Find a nice, sweet tengu girl for him to swoon over, though, and he’s all about hanging around a dove of a lady. As I quote from some chit-chat about hooking up various members of the party: “Look my friends, you’ll notice a distinct lack of tengu in this part of the country. I’m afraid the pickings are pretty slim for me. If you manage to spot a real swan for me though…definitely get my attention.”
It’s modern enough that no one has to translate anything, and avoids anachronism, while giving it a specific flavor that it’s a bird-dude who’s chatting about bird-dudettes.
Some of the best advice I ever heard about voice acting in RPGs came courtesy of the Fear the Boot podcast. One of the hosts referenced a female pirate captain NPC. He just went for the full Barbossa when playing her, and that’s something that would not work in a radio play. You can just picture listeners sitting there saying, “Why does this lady sound like Geoffrey Rush?”
But in the context of a TRPG, all you need to do is sound different enough *from yourself* to indicate character. The voice worked because that was the character’s voice. It becomes the audio equivalent of stagecraft. Same deal with a character that sounds like Dormninja but drops in bird references every other sentence. It’s a cue that you’re portraying somebody else. And that’s enough to get a pass within the fiction.
Many authors have played linguistic games similar to what you’re describing, Colin. Immediately springing to my mind were the many King Arthur variants. T.H White called this type of expression “the High Speech” wherein the characters in moments of great passion expressed their sentiments as a formalized convention within the setting. Thomas Berger in Arthur Rex has an absolutely hilarious opening sequence in which the flowery tone of the narrative is contradicted by the vulgar speech of Uther Pendragon as he urges his soldiers to exert themselves in battle. Of course, writers have all the time in the world to consider the mechanisms through which they deliver the story. The real problem for gamers is that few of us are capable of improvisational brilliance to meet those heroic moments.
“Forth, and fear no darkness! Arise! Arise, Riders of Theoden! Spears shall be shaken, shields shall be splintered! A sword day… a red day… ere the sun rises! “
Loved those moments in “The Once and Future King.” Same deal as The Witcher series HadACookie referenced up top. These authors are intentionally playing with the trope. As you say though, writers have all the time in the world to consider those mechanisms. As roleplayers, we aren’t so lucky.
Your anecdote reminds me of a paranoia game in which I wound up actually shouting, “I am only attracted to females of my own gender!”
I don’t do too much in the way for the “old timey” speech. Though I honestly haven’t had too many characters who would make big impressive speeches. The closest I’ve really come is inventive intimidation or very detailed and/or specific body/facial language. (To be fair, you can convey a LOT with body or facial language, no matter how silly it sometimes winds out looking when you write it down. In fact just the other day I had one of my favorite RP moments in the last few months where an NPC and my character had an entire non-verbal back and forth (and back and forth again) exchange unbeknownst to the entire rest of the party even though they were sitting right there in plain sight.)
Though I do tend to have characters speak in certain ways. Like if I’m playing a low Int character (that I’m actually RPing as a low Int character since sometimes I just ignore what the numbers say about my character since I often view them as ‘there for the mechanics, not the fluff’) I’ll remember not to phrase things in too complex of a manner. Or if Common would not be their first (or even second) language I’ll have them express things in certain ways and sometimes cut out words that a person would normally use while talking that someone unused to the language might not. No matter what I’ll always try and keep in mind how my character’s manner of speech differs from my own, though with somewhat mixed success at actually remembering to do that.
Should have followed that up with, “I identify as Cis-Barbarian! RAAARGH!”
Love me some non-verabals. I’ve got a mantis-totem lunar lady in an Exalted game. I took some cues from the bug, and wind up tilting my head and addressing people without looking directly at them. Is good times.
Like I said in my reply to Dormninja, I think that the key is to sound different enough from yourself to indicate character. Figure out how to do that and you can handwave the rest.
Unfortunately, my Dr. Orpheus occultist needs the words as well as the sounds. Guess I’ll just have to watch more Venture Brothers for research.
Oh. No. HAVING. To watch more Venture Brothers. Whatever. Will. You. Do. You. Poor. Poor. Man.
Man I haven’t watched that show in a long time. I need to do that again sometimes.