[Realm] No-No's of design?

[sayter]

This is going to be a lot simpler than my other posts, and doesnt directly relate to Realm.

I have been doing a few things in terms of the game (character types[classes], GM title, etc) and a comrade pointed out that there are no-nos involved.

I had a character titled a "Taleswapper", basically a bard. He stated that I should simply name it a Bard because otherwise people would jsut think it a stupid attempt to rename something that needed no change. However, my argument is that, in an original setting if they had never used the word Bard before, then obviously he cant be named a bard.

And as for what to call the GM in the book. Is it a poor idea to name it something other than Gamemaster, Dungeon Master, Storyteller or Director? I've seen all these terms used so I dont think its an issue..but if it will end up causing flames and searing remarks in reviews then I would rather avoid a taboo term.

Are there any "i'd advise against it" actions that you have come across in your experience? Many of you have been doin this for years, and this is my first game and I would like a successful and interesting product that appeals to as wide an audience as i can manage.

[dindenver]

Hi!
  I am facing this same issue (and imagine we all are to slme degree). I think that the urge to be original and different from existing games is strong and you probably don't need encouragement there.
  However, at the same time, try and avoid being differnt just for the sake of being different or to avoid using the same term as a nother game. Calling the GM a story teller would not rate you any ridicule for it if your game is about telling a story.
  Don't avoid a good idea or a piece of common language just because someone else uses it. If it makes sense for your game use it, if it doesn't don't give it a second thought.

[Josh Roby]

I'll strip all the RPG terms out of my answer to your question and present it as pure marketing:

Don't rename things that every member of your target audience already calls by another name unless doing so gives you a specific market advantage.

No matter who makes it, every car has a steering wheel.  Renaming it is just silly.  However, despite the fact that the user interface of the Microsoft and Macintosh operating systems have similar elements, they are named differently -- Apple Menu and Start Button, for instance -- to distinguish their brand.

White Wolf games are "Storyteller Games" (very rarely are they branded as Roleplaying Games) and so they have a Storyteller.  In Dungeons and Dragons, it's a Dungeonmaster, because that is the focus of the game (as originally conceived) -- the guy who ran the Dungeon.  In Nobilis, the GM is -- no joke -- called the Hollyhock God.  The reason?  Cause it's funny, and it emphasizes the flower-theme used in the rest of the game.

If you have a recognizable class from "generic" fantasy... let's face it, if you have a recognizable class from D&D, don't rename that class unless the class is a defining element of the game.  If your game had a heavy emphasis on your Taleswappers -- especially if 'Taleswappers' was part of the title -- then it would be advantageous to you to rename them from the rather boring 'Bard'.  But renaming it just to sound cool... nobody will be fooled, and everybody will know you renamed it to make it sound cool, and they will make the further conclusion that the class had to be renamed because it wasn't cool on its own merits.

[Justin Marx]

My favourite GM title was always the "Big Mac Daddy" from Stuperpowers, but anyway...

I agree with Joshua, but I think using alternatives to D&D character class names works, so long as it is consistent with the setting (if the setting has a lot of very specific colour). If the bards in your game were specifically Homeric storytellers and didn't play music etc. and you were trying to evoke some sort of exploration of that, I think it would work. In a specific game setting, evocative titles I think are quite apt to add the colour to make your game different from other fantasy settings, providing they don't border on the ridiculous. I suppose a Taleswapper in this respect would have to be in some way genuinely different from a bard, in concept, effectiveness, resources and play, to warrant it. But it's a good way of reworking old stereotypes into new forms (in small doses, AD&D2 Bard's Guide did have a thousand concept-classes like this, throwing in as many permutations on the Bard as their feeble minds could think of).

Is exploring setting/character important in this respect? If so, change the name. If not, what Joshua said.

Justin

[JarrodHenry]

I would be wary of calling the GM a Dungeon Master, as WOTC has a trademark on that term with regards to RPGs/games.   Under trademark law, they'd be forced to defend that trademark if you used it, which means they'd have to send you a C&D and / or take you to court.  It really isn't worth the risk.

[Bill Masek]

Chris,

My recommendation would be to stay away from standard DnD classes.  It is generally a poor idea to have the "Character who sings and charms people and casts spells and swings swords and tells stories and knows about mystical artifacts and has thieving skills".  If you remake this character you are most likely trying to tap into a well know archetype, so should call it a Bard.

If the purpose of your "Bard" class is to retain the oral history of their people and propagate cultural values then by all means call them Taleswrappers or what ever you want.  Your culture could also have Minstrels with a completely different purpose.

Human societies have many of the same needs.  By setting your society in a midevil fantasy world you will have a lot of overlap with games like DnD.  They all need some way to propagate their cultural values and retain their oral history.  In DnD this is the duty of Bards.  Just because your culture has someone who serves a similar function does not mean you have to give them the same name.  Make their roll more specific or give them additional social functions which differ from the DnD Bard along with a different name and your world will be more unique and that much more immersive.

Best,
       Bill

[Sydney Freedberg]

Amen to Joshua.

I had a character titled a "Taleswapper", basically a bard.

If there's actually something in the game where player-characters swap tales -- if "Okay, I'll tell you this story about The Mighty Gronk, if you tell me that story about The Fair Walinda, because I need to learn another love-song to get a +2 on Romance rolls and you need to learn another battle-song to get a +3 on Inspire Courage rolls" or something like that is actually something these characters do for a significant portion of game-play -- then, sure, name it "taleswapper." If they never, ever actually swap tales, then, yeah, it's just needless confusion, on the order of "I want to call my Barbarian-equivalents 'Swordslingers' even though they almost always use axes!"

Changing the name without changing the thing that you're naming is usually a lost cause -- people who understand what you're doing think you're trying to pull one over on them, people who don't understand just get confused:

Three years after the Air Force added an "A" to highlight the F/A-22 Raptor's ability to drop bombs, the service is dropping the extra letter from the stealthy jet's designator.....The plane, which is expected to officially enter service in the coming weeks, will henceforth be called the F-22A — with the trailing letter indicating a first variant, not an extra role.

Gen. Michael Moseley, Air Force chief of staff, who is said to have been unhappy with the F/A-22 moniker, announced the renaming in a Dec. 12 speech to an Air National Guard senior leadership conference in Baltimore, Md.

...

The Air Force has traditionally labeled its fighter aircraft with the "F" prefix, even ones with some air-to-ground capabilities. The Raptor had been called the "F-22" since its first flights as the prototype YF-22A in the early 1990s.

In September 2002, Gen. John Jumper, then-Air Force chief of staff, added the "A" to emphasize the aircraft's ground-attack capabilities. The switch came as the airplane was being assailed by critics inside and outside the Pentagon as too expensive for the post-Sept. 11 world.
...

(source: http://www.f-22raptor.com/index.php?nid=176)

[sayter]

The Taleswapper doesnt necessarily "swap" tales with others of his profession.

His job is to travel from place to place (species which holds a lot of importance on exploring and learning the secrets of the vast unknown world) and spill the beans, so to speak, on what he has seen. They also listen to stories of others, which they add to their own knowledge and pass at their next stop on their endless journey.

Taleswappers can sing, dance, speak, use poetry etc to spread such knowledge. However, they are also efficient warriors. The world is a very dangerous place outside of civilized space and to be a wanderer type without the ability to defend themselves wuild be suicide.

They thus take the role of a Warrior-Savant. Taleswappers do not possess magick abilities or other "bardic" skills (charming etc). They are just travellers with a taste for history and stories, who view the oral spreading of knowledge as an utterly essential element of culture.

And as for using DungeonMaster, i had no intention of using it. It was stated as example only :) I don't want anything in common with WotC if it can be avoided. They are a locust horde, a plague on the industry. Now, there are some good settings for d20, dont get me wrong. But I hate the fact that they have essentially created a monopoly on the market. Even previously amazing RPGs are converting to d20, which jsut destroys the awesomeness they once had. Thats just my 2 cents, of course.

[MatrixGamer]

I can see a point in calling a GM something else if the something else highlights differences in the role.

For instance in Engle Matrix Games the person who runs the game is the "Referee". I call them that not to be different but to highlight that they have much less power than a D+D like game master. That being said I accept that people will call the ref a game master no matter what I say.

A rose is a rose but some roses have thorns.

Chris Engle
Hamster Press = Engle Matrix Games

[Bill Masek]

Chris,

It sounds like you are safe calling them Taleswappers.  It sounds like they are less of an entertainment source and more gatherers and distributors of information.  To them entertainment is merely a means of spreading knowledge, not an end in and of itself.  This clashes with the classic DnD Bard who, well, does everything, but is generally viewed as an entertainer.

Ironically, what you describe fits the classic real life Midevil Bard.  But it is different enough from the classic Gaming Bard that it warrents its own name.

Best,
       Bill

[Sydney Freedberg]

Well, in real history and mythology there are bards and bards.

In ancient Irish legend, as I recall, a bard had a kind of diplomatic immunity -- no one could lawfully harm him, or even refuse him food and a place to stay -- and his words were deemed so powerful that if he composed a "satire" against even a great king, the king was considered humiliated and broken, and might even develop physical afflictions and disfigurements as a result of the bard's song. There's at least once legendary Irish bard who exploited these powers by going around the country threatening to satirize people if they didn't give him whatever he wanted.

In Norse culture, on the other hand, I think the bard (skald?) was honored because only in his words might a warrior's fame outlive death. Every chieftain had to have a skald to sing the praises of him and his men in the hall at night. So a "bard" of this type might have the power to increase morale, loyalty, and courage. I believe Orkworld has a similar "bard" type with a rule that if the bard doesn't see your heroic deeds, you don't get any XP for them!

By contrast to these figures from real folk talkes, the D&D "bard" is just some schmuck running around with a lute who can sort-of steal stuff and sort-of do magic and sort-of fight. Boooooooring. Lesson: Don't just imitate D&D, go imitate the originals that D&D imitated -- read some Tolkein (Lord of the Rings), Lewis (Narnia), Howard (Conan), Moorcock (Elric), and some collections of old folks tales, and you'll find stuff that will blow you away.

[Bill Masek]

Sydney,

Bards were a major feature of Christendom from the fall of Rome (and the corresponding great loss of literature) until the invention of the printing press.  Durring this time bards spread stories and news across Europe while reinforcing cultural values.  Durring different times and in different places they had different titles and reinforced different cultural values.

This is not really relevant for Chris the Sayter's purposes.  It is a question of recognisability.  Bard is a recognisable term.  Just like if I were to say Paladin few gamers would think of a man who journeyed on one of the Crusades, when most gamers hear about bards their first reaction is to think about the DnD archetype.  Since Chris the Sayter's Taleswappers are very different from the recognisable DnD archetype, sharing a name with it would provide no benefit and only serve to confuse potential gamers.

Chris the Sayter should feel free to use Taleswapper for his storytellers.

Best,
        Bill

PS:  That's not a bad starting list, although I would add Lloyd Alexander (Prydain).

[Sydney Freedberg]

Bards were a major feature of Christendom from the fall of Rome (and the corresponding great loss of literature) until the invention of the printing press.

I did not know that. Cool. (If you know a good book on the subject, please PM me; no need to jack the thread any further!).

[dindenver]

Hi!
  Here are some semi-reliable links:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bard
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bard_%28Soviet_Union%29
  Hope it helps!

[sayter]

Very interesting information. I would say that the Taleswapper definitely fits closer to the "enforcing culture values" and spreading knowledge. In a world where civilization is more or less confined to a central region of a single continent, and there is so much unexplored territory, their tales and knowledge would be extremely sought and highly valued.

Imagine, for isntance, he and his party brave the (insert dreaful place here) and come back with information on the forgotten history of the world. Not only can he enthrall an audience with such info....he can also SELL it (although I doubt all taleswappers would be seekign fortune...they do it because it needs to be done. But, everyone needs to eat.) for vast quantities of cash. Historians and scholars would pay a kings ransom for it.  And if the taleswapper had the original BOOKS with the knowledge in them....even better.

There will of course be similar sorts of people in other cultures, closer to the traditional travelling minstrel archetype.

I am not aiming for "classes" though. More for a "skill set" for players. I'm aiming for about 3 per kingdom and a few for each race. This way new players can see at a glance the sort of things they can create with the system.