Fantasy Cliches Are Both Good and Bad

[Amazon warrior]

we kind of broke this in our TTRPG, umm...our dark elf (yours truly) was not only a girl with a sour attitude, but also the tank of the group, absorbing obscene amounts of damage, great for crowd control and with a few spells to boost ourself. Our wizard was a little boy who could turn into either a water nymph or a muscle-bound fighter (and did both actually on regular occasion) our last member, the dexterity based one was a samurai girl so...not many cliche's there right?

Your talk of samurai reminds me of the one and only time I played "Mountain Witch". There were three players and the GM, and I was the only girl in the group. My character was also female and got some very mixed reactions from the two male samurai during the journey up the mountain. It all became much clearer at the end of the game, where it was revealed that one of the "male" samurai was actually also a girl but in disguise and the other was male but wanted to be a girl. Man, that was a strange game.

 

[Altorin]

I would only be really bothered by it if I was identifiably scottish (My last name starting with a Mac, not a Mc ;P)

Mc is still Scottish. Just more anglophied. In my school there's more Mcs than Macs. A lot more. (I live in Scotland.)

I was just totally full of fail in my post, all round fail.

I concede all points against mine.

However, interesting to note that I was reading the Scion book (It's a White Wolf game, sort of like Exalted Modern), and the Dwarves in the preface story talk in a Minnesotean accent.. It really more reads like a really bad canadian accent, or a really bad Sarah Palin impression.

But it reminded me of this thread.

 

[lomylithruldor]

I would only be really bothered by it if I was identifiably scottish (My last name starting with a Mac, not a Mc ;P)

Mc is still Scottish. Just more anglophied. In my school there's more Mcs than Macs. A lot more. (I live in Scotland.)

I was just totally full of fail in my post, all round fail.

I concede all points against mine.

However, interesting to note that I was reading the Scion book (It's a White Wolf game, sort of like Exalted Modern), and the Dwarves in the preface story talk in a Minnesotean accent.. It really more reads like a really bad canadian accent, or a really bad Sarah Palin impression.

But it reminded me of this thread.

I'm pretty sure that Neil Gaiman's American Gods was a strong inspiration for Scion. If you've read it, you know what I mean. If you haven't, GET IT!

 

[Redweevil]

I once played Neverwinter Nights with a friend, and his first character defied all cliches. He made Gurkin Smockbash, the half-orc palladin, who couldnt string a sentence together, killed a merchant for no reason, and had a crush on Lady Aribeth.

I wish i knew some people who played D&D it sounds fun. I would love to play a foul mouthed hard drinking palladin

 

[rddj623]

Good stuff here Greg. I agree that sometimes you need the cliches even in the aesthetics, especially for beginners. Just to get them comfortable, but as you grow in role playing, you should seek to branch out and be original

 

[rossatdi]

Dwarves are Scottish because they hold grudges for ever, drink too much and are overly aggressive.

 

[Zolem]

Our party has a halfling paladin. He helped to negotiate a larger payment for saving a town from orcs, not because he was greedy, but because he had a wife and seven kids to support. That's right, a salaryman halfling paladin. We also have:

A healer trained by an order of pacifists, who comes from a millitary family, and so has no problems with killing. Oh, and he worships all the gods, even the contradictory ones, all equally and all at the same time. NG because he generaly wants to help people, and the god thing is more out of respect than actuall fervrent worship.

An elven ranger who favors goblins and the longbow style. She is also a lesbian and enjoys stirring up trouble in an impish manner. She also is racist against humans, seeing them as oportunistic, greedy, and racist.

A halfling rouge who's on the run from her old thieves guild because she did some double dealing with stolen goods under the table without giving the guild its cut. See tried to stir up a conflict between a dwarven mining company and the towns government so that she could rob the mayor blind and blame it on the dwarves.

As the DM, I filled my world with cliche on purpose just to see what happens when I let these guys lose on it. When you have to say 'Ok, you used up your free action for talking' when your healer is trying to have a phylosophical discussion with your evil masked spellcaster ridding a flying monster, you know things have gone crazy. Naturaly, I have plenty of origional points in there too. Such as the dragon the town is scared of and has only seen in the distance is actually only a draggone. The PCs have viewed it off in the distance twice, but rolled low enough that they drew the conclusion themselves that it is a dragon. I never stated that is was, it only had shiny scales, was large, and had batlike wings and a long tail.

When you throw in the odd piece, disguise it so that they think it's a cliche at first. Dragon filling a town with fear that it will eventually attack? *yawn* Wait, it's not a dragon but a rarely used monster that the town mistook for a dragon? How will that play out?

 

[znix]

In the end, it doesn't matter, as long as the game functions. As was pointed out above, baseball is comprised of the same (extremely boring) types, yet it still functions (in its own boring fashion).

Regardless, I think there is more fun to be had by being unique. If you're the only one who can heal, you better do it right because people depend on you. Same for tanking, AOEing, kiting, etc. People have roles to play and you're not easily substituted. If the healer goes down, suddenly tactics might have to change. If the tank dies, same thing. In a group comprised of homogenous same type all-round players, it's only a mild loss if someone perishes. Nobody really cares until enough of the group has gone that it starts looking bleak.

In a baseball team, if some guy is out, who really cares? Not many. How about in an online baseball game where nobody is famous, then nobody truly cares at all.
Even FPS games become more engrossing and interesting when you have specific roles to play such as medic, demolitions, sniper and so on. You gotta watch each other, communicate and coordinate.

 

[Serioli]

Had a cliche played out quite sweetly in one of our games. Our 2nd level wizard got given a pointy hat by the children of a chap we saved, " 'cause you must have lost it."

The guy kept that hat for the whole campaign.

Our hated one was always 'my parents were killed by orcs' though.

 

[CeallaSo]

I'm probably a little late on this one, but it seems like no one mentioned it so I figured I might as well. The traditional idea of a wizard as "wizened old man with a pointy hat, robe and staff" is at least partially based on the Norse idea of Odin the Wanderer, a guise that the god Odin would take while traveling around Midgard. His appearance was meant to be that of a simple, fragile traveler, and he would use peoples' misconceptions based on this as a way of testing them.

Since Odin was strong, wise, and a god, he was obviously capable of fantastic, superhuman feats. Tolkien drew directly from this idea when designing his wizards, especially Gandalf, which helped it root itself even further in the public's subconscious.

 

[Johnny Impact]

My last wizard character was a gangly kid who kept trying to pull off wizardly hauteur without possessing the age or wisdom normally required. Since wizards must have beards, he had coaxed a few pale scraggles onto his chin. No one would have called it a beard. Since wizards must have pointy hats, he'd bought one. Being brand new, it completely lacked the moth-eaten look, and did not flop properly. He kept tripping over his robes. And it's awful hard to make words of power sound earth-shatteringly impressive when your voice owes less to Christopher Lee than it does to Tobey Maguire - and still cracks once in a while. The harder he tried to be taken seriously, the more laughter he drew. (Yeah, I know, sounds like Rincewind. In my defense, I drew up the character before reading Discworld.)

My last paladin had been exiled from his order over a doctrinal disagreement before the game began. Rather than a shining example of potential, the (corrupt) head of his order used him as a cautionary tale, a warning to those who would question canon. My guy's struggle was not to bring light into dark places, but to figure out a moral course of action that would allow him to remove the corrupt leader without destroying the order.

My last rogue was lawful good. He worked for the crown as a counterintelligence agent. Rather than getting in trouble due to a complete lack of scruples, as your average chaotic-neutral rogue would, he had too strict an ethical code to perform his job in the most expedient manner.

I wish I'd understood when I was younger how much fun it is to pervert or ignore stereotypes. I used to play dumb door-kickers every time.