Historical Inaccuracy

[Marco]

Whew ... I had something to say about Paul's historical-setting thread--but we were so close to the launch of our newest world book that it was better to wait.

We've been working on a book called C-13. It's a "steampunk" world (sort of) and it has a strong historical back-bone.

The world takes place in an alternate modern day where the discovery of the New World was mixed with the discovery of powerful magic so that in 2002 AD the original 13 Colonies are all that exists of the US.

The relevant part here is that we wanted to have a very strong historical flavor--a definite sense of history and place--to the world. That took a lot of research (even though the world diverges almost completely from 1492 on).

So what was our conclusion? Historical research for a setting whether you're "being true to it" or "fantasizing" it is a huge bonus in world creation. We found things that we'd *never* have come up with on our own. The raw facts of the early colonial period were rife with plot ideas, characters, and places to explore (George Washington created a company called Adventurers for the Draining of the Great Swamp ... or something like that--a perfect place to start PC's).

So while I'm not sure as to the *value* having a "compeltely accurate" historical setting, I think that pound-for-pound the research we did paid off.

-Marco

[JAGS C-13: The Thirteen Colonies is a 138pg illustrated book. It can be downloaded for free at
http://jagsgame.dyndns.org/index2.html ]

[James V. West]

I agree.

Research yields huge dividends of inspiration. My own research of King Arthur has inspired endless variations on the theme and endless ideas for games. http://www.geocities.com/randomordercreations/tqb1intro.html">The Questing Beast is a vision based mostly on fancy. I have plans for an Arthurian game based more on history.

One pet project I've been kicking around is to turn the history and geography of my own county into a fantasy rpg. I'm having a lot of fun brainstorming on that idea.

[Laurel]

Ditto on research providing inspiration.  I came up with the name for my game, Devils Cay, when I was researching what private islands were for sale out there in the world.  Discovering it there in the Bahamas set the tone for so much else.  Now that I'm reading up on the Bahamas, all sorts of little pieces of useful information are cropping up and the game is getting written fairly quickly.

Laurel

[Mike Holmes]

Wrote a one-shot where the players were to attend a feast in honor of Isabel and Ferdinand on their conquest of Grenada (thus removing the Moors from power in Spain). The scenario wrote itself. I had more fascinating NPCs than I could handle. My favorite was Machiavelli, but the whole Borgia clan was very interesting. Yep, the historical thing works really well for one-shots.

Mike

[Joe Murphy (Broin)]

I ran a 2 year Mage game based on a song lyric ("in a tower of steel, natures forges a deal, to raise wonderful hell") and an hour in my local library.

In turns out that the town I live in, Stirling, owes a lot to the Knights Templar (woo!), source of all sorts of wonderful conspiratorial ideas. A branch of the Templars settled here a few hundred years ago, giving the name of one of their rituals to a suburb (Bannockburn - 'bannocks' are cakes they made) and various other bits of history.

And then all I had to do was throw in connections to the inordinate numbers of Masonic lodges nearby. And then came the occult architecture research. And then mad theories about ancient Egyptians settling in the Highlands of Scotland, but I can't remember where that came from.

As the posters above have said, it wrote itself.

Joe.

[Mike Holmes]

I think that the guys who write Law and Order must laugh about how easy their jobs are all the time. Get together in the afternoon, read the paper, look up a case or two, an voila! instant TV. Yep, nothing like RL for inspiration.

What other RL sources have people used for games?

Mike

[Joe Murphy (Broin)]

What other RL sources have people used for games?

I was struggling to think of examples, but then thought of one I used last week.

Inspired by http://www.rpg.net/news+reviews/reviews/rev_5511.html">De Profundis, I mailed a like-minded friend and player, Scott. Scott plays a lot of fascinating, strongly narrativist online pbem games, mostly on Yahoo Groups. The games are superheroic, usually set in the Marvel Universe, and have a collosal amount of trust between like-minded players. It sounds peachy.

Anyway, I emailed him from a new account('dzidoriusposka@hotmail.com' has a nice ring to it)puporting to be one Dzidorius Poska, psychology student at the University of Lithuania at Vilnius. I researched Vilnius. Looked up a bit about the country. Sketched out a vaguely Lovecraftian tale. The usual.

I mailed Scott under the pretense that Poska's younger brother had shared an apartment at Stirling Uni, and that, just before disapearing last summer, the brother had mailed a stolen fossil back to Dzid. The fossil was of an unknown species of squid.

The very next day, http://news.bbc.co.uk/hi/english/sci/tech/newsid_1723000/1723595.stm">this story broke. I was rather pleased with myself. =)

(and obviously, Scott was scared out of his wits)

Joe.


[ This Message was edited by: Joe Murphy (Broin) on 2001-12-28 20:11 ]

[joshua neff]

In turns out that the town I live in, Stirling, owes a lot to the Knights Templar (woo!), source of all sorts of wonderful conspiratorial ideas.

Being as I am a huge fan of Templar conspiracy theories (play 6 degrees with the Templars--it's a hoot!), I am immensely jealous.

& now I'll shut up before I start babbling about my Vampire Slayer/Priory of Sion idea.

[Joe Murphy (Broin)]

Obviously, Mr Neff, if you want anything from the area to support your mad Templar theories, lemme know. Y'know, postcards, maps, that kind of thing. =)

Joe.