Altering common tropes to make them more interesting

[Xeviat]

One simple trick I think is to mix two historical cultures to create something unique. The first region I'm developing for my setting is a mixture of the Holy Roman Empire and Asian tropes (the presence of animism and philosophies that are elevated to the status of religion). Their major faith has a mixture of Christian and Confucian qualities to it.

If you think about cultures organically, starting with where they grew from (my human culture were originally slaves, so they've always despised slavery in all forms; though indentured servitude is a different matter), you can change foundational elements and then imagine how that might change the end result.

For your "vikings", I think making fundamental changes to their religion would drastically change the end result. As Lath said, changing their reason for raiding other settlements would also be a good place to start.

[Garanth]

The glory of historical allusions is that they really help the reader/players to relate to the environment. They're easily recognizable, and help to distinguish your countries and races without forcing readers/players to memorize an encyclopedia worth of information on each.

To give these people a "viking" flavour, all you need to do is figure out what the most important aspects of the allusion are. Once you have those, you can build the rest from scratch.

For the vikings, you their mythology, the horned helmets, the longboats, coastal raiding, and being from the north. I agree that the helmets are cliche, and should go. The mythology could also probably use a facelift, though things like references to the "halls of Valhalla" have a really cool ring to them IMO and should stay. Drop any more than that, and you'll run the risk of losing the flavour and ending up with a largely vanilla race of raiders.

The rest can be filled in as you like though. Are they governed democratically or by a monarch? Are they nomadic, or live in settled towns? Are those towns all small, or are some of them cities? Are they organized tribally, by clans, lineage groups, family? Are those groups important, or is membership to the larger group the most important?

Flesh out enough of those kind of questions, and your race will be memorable. You really only feel the cliches when they're used as a crutch. If the flavour is given by cliches, the whole thing will feel cliched. If the flavour is given by how well you've developed the culture, it won't feel cliched even if the cliches are in there.

[SilvercatMoonpaw]

Are they governed democratically or by a monarch?

Democratic vikings sound like a lot of fun.  :D

[Garanth]

Are they governed democratically or by a monarch?

Democratic vikings sound like a lot of fun.  :D

Funnily enough, the vikings in Iceland had one of the world's first democratic assemblies called the   Althing. To quote the wiki article:

"The Althing is one of the oldest parliamentary institutions in the world, this including the Faroese Løgting and Manx Tynwald.[1][2][3] Its establishment, as an outdoor assembly held on the plains of Þingvellir from about the year 930 AD, laid the foundation for an independent national existence in Iceland. To begin with, the Althing was a general assembly of the Icelandic Commonwealth, where the country's most powerful Leaders (goðar) met to decide on legislation and dispense justice. Then, all free men could attend the assemblies, which were usually the main social event of the year and drew large crowds of farmers and their families, parties involved in legal disputes, traders, craftsmen, storytellers and travellers. Those attending the assembly dwelt in temporary camps (búðir) during the session. The center of the gathering was the Lögberg, or Law Rock, a rocky outcrop on which the Lawspeaker (lögsögumaður) took his seat as the presiding official of the assembly. His responsibilities included reciting aloud the laws in effect at the time. It was his duty to proclaim the procedural law of Althing to those attending the assembly each year."

Roleplaying ideas galore eh? Just think of how cool a viking Althing could be for a group of pcs invited to join, especially should there be an epic quest opportunity presented at the meeting. Think of the scene in the 13th warrior, where a party is formed to head north to the aide of a community plagued by demons and a mighty fire serpent.

This actually gives me some pretty cool ideas for my own viking-themed nation. Important legislature is decided upon annually at the Althing, and the wisest and strongest man is also chosen to be the people's king (either by vote, or by a contest of arms). Bards, story tellers, merchants, and magicmen all show up to partake in the festivities, joined by a fair share of drunken rowdiness and inappropriate behaviour.

[Ghostman]

...Not to mention all the backhanded politicking going on behind the scenes. Having characters duped into doing the dirty work of any one of factions trying to influence the decisions by bribing, intimidating, discrediting their rivals, etc. would make for a nice plot hook. Yes, I will definitely have the 'Things' be a feature in my setting's norse-esque culture.

As for how to break the trope a little, I just now got this idea of combining the concept of elected rulers with the concept of living god-kings. May sound a bit contradictory, but that just makes it more interesting. First the leader would be chosen at the Thing, then undergo a ritual that transforms him into a living god (or rather something that the people believe to be a living god). For an added twist this transformation could be quite gruesome, forcing the newly made god-king to never show his face, hiding it behind an iron mask. His reign, being mandated by his supposed divinity, will last until his death at which point a new god-king will be elected.

Of corse I'll need to flesh out this idea more if I'm going to go along with it. Comments and suggestions are welcome!

[Jürgen Hubert]

Jürgen Hubert: Your take on the Elven Islands in Urbis is interesting. It seems similar to the modernization of Japan. Was that perhaps a source of inspiration for you? EDIT: oh, there it says it, on the bottom of the page. D'oh!

I'm wondering how useful these kind of "Designer's Notes" are to gamers. I think it might help if it allows them to get a clearer picture of the setting, but I haven't received any feedback on it yet.

Frankly, there is no need to try to come up with something truly new and unique - which would likely fail anyway - when there is so much history and mythology in our own world to plunder...

[Raven Bloodmoon]

As a world builder I tend to look at real mythologies, culture and history for inspiration and ideas. But in drawing influences from these sources, I fear that I'm going to end up repeating tired old tropes and cliches. There's a conflict between my desire to make use of ideas and forms that I like on the one hand, and my desire to present something more original on the other. That's why I like to change, twist and mix the common elements I make use of, transforming them into something new. This is not easy, since taking it too far will severe their connection to their roots, at which point they become nothing more than old labels slapped on something entirely different. But I also think that for best results the changes should be more than just cosmetic ones.

One thing I always liked about Robert Heinlein's works was that people named things logically.  If he talked about settlers on another planet having to defend against dragons (see Time Enough for Love), they weren't necessarily dragons, but they were giant lizard-like beasts.  If it looks enough like an egg, it is okay to call it an egg, even if it's not an egg.  It makes the setting feel more human (and consequently more real).

On a side note, as much as I love the movie, it always bothered me that the producers of Starship Troopers took Heinlein literally and made the aliens giant bugs.  Not that space marines fighting giant insects is bad, but....

In this thread I hope we could share ideas and discuss ways of altering various tropes in our settings. Pointing out examples of successful modification of common themes and elements in literature, games, etc could also be insightful.

One thing I often find useful is to hit up some obscure culture for a bit of flavoring.  Vikings are cool.  Swedish pirates plying the southern Mediteranean sounds fun, but try looking up the Finnish specifically.  They are kind of vikingish, but they didn't follow the Norse gods at all.  In fact, they have their own whacky mythology.  They also have awesome folk music.  And Nightwish.  I digress.

You might look to the entire Dune series to see how Frank Herbert had fun with 10,000 years of future history and Islam.  

I am myself having trouble with one particular theme at the moment. For quite some time now I've known that I want to include a people of Viking-like pirates and raiders in my Savage Age. Now, Vikings certainly are a well-known and fairly often used theme, to the point that they may be considered a cliche. I definitely want to add some twists to these people so that they will defy the expectations - but I also want to preserve much of that norse flavour and the concept of warlike longship-sailing raiders, traders and explorers. It's proven quite a dilemma, as I can't seem to come up with any good ideas.

Consider looking up information on the Phoenetians, as they were prolific seafarers and traders.  Perhaps a blend of the two would be interesting.  Also, look up some Indian and southeast asian stuff on seafareing and pirates from that region.  You could always make them somewhat more heavily pirate than viking in flavor, too.

One thing I've decided is that a group of these northmen has conquered and colonized a southern land with a mix of Hispanic and North-African feel to it. They've cross-bred with the natives of the area and produced a new mixed generation. While I consider this to be fairly interesting, it only affects that one group and doesn't do anything to the rest of the raider people. I could use some suggestions here.

You mention the viking pirates intermixing with the southern Mediteranean types.  As someone mentioned, if this is the time when the Moors were in Spain, Islam will be prevalent.  Imagine if your vikings started incorporating bits of Islam into their own religion.  Imagine if they picked up some of the zeal and stringency from Islam.  What if some religious ruler in the south declared a jihad in the name of the most holy Odin and his ever-victorious champion Thor on someone/something?  How can they believe they'll be anything but unstoppable with the One-Eyed Doombringer and the Thunder istelf on their side?

The power of belief can often bring about events that would normally never happen.  I was chatting with a friend in Turkey about a week ago and just asking him questions about Turkey and what not.  Extremely fascinating history I never really knew existed.  He said that the thing that defeated the Ottoman Empire was not a Brittish spy giving aid and weapons to arabs within their borders or to half of europe attacking them at once.  It wasn't the use of thigns like chemical warfare (which they refused to use).  It was the rabid nationalism they encountered.  People so fanatical about their own country that they just refused defeat.  It was an interesting thought.

[Ghostman]

I think I'm going to name my norse-esque people "Megnir". Their petty kings are elected at Things, where all free Men have the right to vote. From amongst these kings can rise particularly powerful rulers, known as Iron Kings, determined by means of ritual combat between the elected kings.

An Iron King has authority over the petty kings and is considered a God on earth after undergoing a magical ritual which kills him and awakens him as living dead. He begins this transformation by drinking black wine from a magical goblet and withdrawing into an underground chamber. After three days and three nights, he will emerge as a living dead, concealing his face behind an ornate iron mask, for it is a taboo among the Megnir to gaze at the face of a God.

An Iron King reigns as long as his life-in-death lasts, which can greatly exceed Man's natural lifespan. Iron Kings cannot be slain by normal weapons, making them extremely formidable warriors in battle. They have to be defeated in other ways, such as by drowning or burning. They are unaffected by poisons and possess superhuman strength. They also have the ability to summon long-dead heroes to fight at their side as ghost warriors.

[Raven Bloodmoon]

So it's like the genghis khan was a Viking Jesus that could summon mythic warriors from Valhalla?  Kind of cool.

Is there currently an Iron King?  What happenned to the last one?  I'd have to believe that when one is destroyed, it's a pretty big deal for the Megnir.  I'd also think that it'd form one hell of a power vacuum.

How much of an Iron King's personality/humanity remains after the transformation?  Dying has got to put you in a bad mood, I'd think.

[Ghostman]

There are a few Iron Kings around (and plenty more petty kings, most of whom swear allegiance to one Iron King or another). A new Iron King can only be created to take the place of a fallen one. When one of them does fall, it's going to be a major event, that's true. You'll have plenty of lesser kings wanting to become an Iron King, hence they're supposed to engage in ritualistic combat to determine who is the most worthy.

The transformation retains the character's memories and personality, but his consciousness will be expanded and the death-experience can be quite shocking. How exactly the character reacts to this depends on the individual.

[Garanth]

There are a few Iron Kings around (and plenty more petty kings, most of whom swear allegiance to one Iron King or another). A new Iron King can only be created to take the place of a fallen one. When one of them does fall, it's going to be a major event, that's true. You'll have plenty of lesser kings wanting to become an Iron King, hence they're supposed to engage in ritualistic combat to determine who is the most worthy.

The transformation retains the character's memories and personality, but his consciousness will be expanded and the death-experience can be quite shocking. How exactly the character reacts to this depends on the individual.

You sure you want to throw the Iron Kings right out there, rather than using them sparingly? I'd imagine a god-king like that only arising once every thousand years (though there were many in times of yore...), sent by the gods to unite the norse in times of great need, or to lead them to glorious victories.

Not meaning to rain on your parade, because it's an awesome idea. I just wonder whether it would have more of an effect if used more sparingly. A living god with an iron mask would be quite the powerful spectacle, making many other things pale in comparison. If god kings walking the earth is a regular, every day occurance...then how awesome are things that come around every millenia going to have to be?

What about if "iron king" is a ceremonial title, and doesn't necessarily refer to a true "Iron King" of old. Perhaps the performance of a ritual to create a true god king have been lost, or the gods do not shine on the norse any more and are unwilling to grant the power the mortal kings. That way the crowning of a new true "iron king" would be a *huge* deal, and be an event that the players could truly wrap themselves around (perhaps even seeking to be crowned the first iron king in a millenia themselves).

This is just how I'd do it though, since I prefer a lower-fantasy setting. I just find it easier to manage player's expectations when you hold back with the fantastic elements a bit.

[Ghostman]

I disagree that this isn't fitting for low fantasy. It's not like there's Iron Kings all over the place, they count up to a handful or so. And they're not really 'godlike' either, they're basically just intelligent, glorified zombies with some special powers. Egyptian pharaos were supposed to be living gods too, and they weren't a once in a millenia phenomenon.

[Garanth]

I disagree that this isn't fitting for low fantasy. It's not like there's Iron Kings all over the place, they count up to a handful or so. And they're not really 'godlike' either, they're basically just intelligent, glorified zombies with some special powers. Egyptian pharaos were supposed to be living gods too, and they weren't a once in a millenia phenomenon.

Ah, that's what I mean though. Egyptian pharoahs were just people, who were made out to be like gods. Same thing with the whole "divine power" thing of the rulers in 17th century europe, it lent legitimacy to their throne.

However, that legitimacy had to have come from somewhere. In our world it came from successful PR campaigns, but it would be much cooler if it came from a history of rulers who actually *WERE* gods, or appointed by gods.

Thus in a low-fantasy setting, your so-called Iron Kings are simply men wearing the ceremonial costume of the Iron Kings of old, with access to the simple dwoemers that pass for magic these days. Therefore bringing a TRUE Iron King into the world, with all the power and ability of a king from the golden age of the norse, would be a truly epic event. That was more what I was getting at, applying the standard low-fantasy "everything was better back in the day" model to the Iron Kings.

Even just a regular dude Iron King is a good twist on the standard norse mythos though. Perhaps some galley-sized longboats to bring them up to speed amongst other advanced late-medieval cultures, and you're nearly there.

[Ghostman]

Thus in a low-fantasy setting, your so-called Iron Kings are simply men wearing the ceremonial costume of the Iron Kings of old, with access to the simple dwoemers that pass for magic these days. Therefore bringing a TRUE Iron King into the world, with all the power and ability of a king from the golden age of the norse, would be a truly epic event. That was more what I was getting at, applying the standard low-fantasy "everything was better back in the day" model to the Iron Kings.

I don't view that as a standard model for low fantasy, nor do I agree that one cannot have supernatural beings as deified kings in a low fantasy setting. But I don't want to turn this into a discussion about what is and isn't low fantasy.

Even just a regular dude Iron King is a good twist on the standard norse mythos though. Perhaps some galley-sized longboats to bring them up to speed amongst other advanced late-medieval cultures, and you're nearly there.

My setting is not late medieval though, not by a long shot. Some aspects of viking technology are fairly advanced for it, especially seafaring-related stuff.