English Colony sounding names

[Gamer Printshop]

This is a quick question for some detail ideas. I am working on a map (not a setting) of a pseudo English Colonial America, but not America. I've got Nova Sarum, New Cumbria, New Strathclyde, Bethland, Edwardia and Charlotta. I'm going to change Charlotta to Carlotia. I find "Edwardia" cumbersome to the ears, perhaps because I've never heard Edward used in a regional name, but I don't know what else to replace it with. I'm hinting to possible alternate English monarchs to replace Georgia/Virginia, perhaps using Edward or Henry to base it off, but I don't know how to make either to sound right. Any suggestions.

Here's a link to my G+ community where I have that map posted as the most recent post (its currently 200 ppi, 18 x 24 inches, I don't have a reduced version posted anywhere to post here directly - I'm still in the design process and don't usually create thumbnail versions for questions).

This isn't for publication, nor even intended for actual play, its just a map development, but I'd like to get the Colony names right, anyway.

Suggestions?

Edit: I decided on Carlotia, Henricia instead of Edwardia, and opted for Patronia as another. So I don't need any help, thanks anyway!

[Gamer Printshop]

Here's what I was trying to do, and my solution to the issue I posted. A period style map for a ficticious land, not dissimilar to the English colonies of America, just not...

[Steerpike]

Really lovely map.

Strange tangent: not many games seem to be set in the early colonial period.  Lots of games get set in faux-medieval Europe and the Wild West is a hugely popular setting for games (Boot Hill, Dogs in the Vineyard, Deadlands, Aces & Eights, etc), but the 16th-18th centuries get strangely neglected - even when you do see games in those time periods they're usually firmly Old World in their assumed setting (En Garde!, Flashing Blades).  The closest that I can think of are piratical games (7th Sea, Pirates!), but mainland North America (or its fantasy equivalent) in the earlier days of colonization is rarely seen as a gaming setting.  Why do you think that's so?

[HippopotamusDundee]

Because setting a game in that period means you have little choice but to wade into the extremely sensitive historical ground of relations between the settlers and the indigenous American tribes?

[Steerpike]

I thought of that too, but Wild West games have the exact same problem, and yet there are Wild West games everywhere.  It's not like conflicts were dying out in the 19th century - there were lots of batles and uprisings and massacres (to name just a few: Sand Creek (1864), Washita River (1868), Wounded Knee (1890)) throughout that period as well.  Lots of films and novels in the Western genre focus on those conflicts, too, in a whole range of different ways.

[HippopotamusDundee]

Perhaps a reflection of the changed power structures then? As I understand it (and I am Australian so I'm not especially well-versed with American colonial history) the power of the indigenous American tribes and nations were waning by the time the Wild West hit - the colonists were clearly on the rise.

In that case perhaps the discomfort with earlier periods is having to confront and realize the fact that America was well and truly occupied by sophisticated cultures before the arrival of Europeans that were then, to some degree, destroyed by those colonists?

[Steerpike]

That's an interesting thesis.  Apart from the American Revolutionary War/War of Independence, the period in general doesn't seem as susceptible to romanticization as either the Wild West or the medieval period (in many ways, of course, the cowboy/gunslinger of the Western is a reworking of the Knight Errant anyway).  The particular dynamics of indigeneity and colonialism at the time might be a big part of that.

This is probably just the way my head works, but the setting would be great for a Puritan Horror kind of game of the Solomon Kane variety.  There's plenty of material to draw on, particularly the Salem trials and the Sleepy Hollow legends and all that kind of thing, and the early colonies were all in Lovecraft Country anyway...

[HippopotamusDundee]

It does tend to be the way things go - if you look at the history of colonization in Australia there's a similar gap in popular portrayals of the conflict-and-incompatibility period of settlement (no-one really liked to talk about the period between 1820 to 1860ish).

It's not just your head at all - I think that would be an absolutely fantastic game (you should totally write a setting for it :D). I know that in the Solomon Kane RPG there were a couple of modules set in late-1500s America which had some similarity to that. It also sounds like it might be akin to Manly Wade Wellman's stories about Silver John, but less specifically and essentially Appalachian and in an earlier period.

[Steerpike]

Astonishingly and unpardonably considering my area of academic research I was not familiar with Wellman and Silver John (or if I was I'd forgotten all about him).  Many thanks!

[Humabout]

Really lovely map.

Strange tangent: not many games seem to be set in the early colonial period.  Lots of games get set in faux-medieval Europe and the Wild West is a hugely popular setting for games (Boot Hill, Dogs in the Vineyard, Deadlands, Aces & Eights, etc), but the 16th-18th centuries get strangely neglected - even when you do see games in those time periods they're usually firmly Old World in their assumed setting (En Garde!, Flashing Blades).  The closest that I can think of are piratical games (7th Sea, Pirates!), but mainland North America (or its fantasy equivalent) in the earlier days of colonization is rarely seen as a gaming setting.  Why do you think that's so?

As a totally uneducated non-history buff type, I'd say it's largely because as Americans, we often view those times in a similar light as the Greeks viewed the Illiad or Odyssey.  We almost deify the people surrounding our founding.  Moreover, those times are pretty well documented, not leaving much room for creative anachronism.  Personally, I think that timeframe might be awesome for a secret magic-type setting, but not a full-on high fantasy.  It breaks the suspension of disbelief when George Washington ends up fighting British vampires from the back of his trusty silver dragon, so to speak.

[LD]

>>In that case perhaps the discomfort with earlier periods is having to confront and realize the fact that America was well and truly occupied by sophisticated cultures before the arrival of Europeans that were then, to some degree, destroyed by those colonists?

I really don't think so. Americans aren't as sensitive about native cultures in the same sense that perhaps Canadians would be and it's not a personal issue for people because most Americans don't know any true Amerinds anyway, other than people you will run into who claim 1/16th or some other dilution of Amerind blood.

Also, Americans really don't care much about Amerind cultures in the colonial times and I have yet to meet an American, other than extreme left wing ones who take up *every* social cause, who expresses any deep regret about marginalization of Amerinds in colonial times-I haven't met many who have said they are proud of it, but there certainly is nothing like the German penance for WWII-the issue is too far ago in time and the usual assumption is that most of the Amerinds died of foreign diseases introduced by Europeans (I seem to recall that the population halved- and the major killer was disease, not warfare).

American history books also have very little to say about colonial era Amerinds, which could be a cause of the lack of care mentioned in the previous paragraph. There is a bit about the Pilgrims and the natives who actually knew about native crops; there is a bit about the Iroquois Confederacy as a potential source of inspiration for Benjamin Franklin and the Founders' original Articles of Confederacy. Then, there's a bit about Techumseh. Modern books do focus more on non-European history of ancient america, but they focus on the anasazi, who died out, or the Mayas/Aztec, who weren't in North America, and a bit on the Mississippian culture- which, again, wasn't around when the Colonials arrived.

Now, game designers may have different concerns than the general public, as may game players... but I think it boils down to the Revolutionary period not being distinct or interesting from a gaming point of view outside of horror, as was mentioned above. (Cthulhu is very appropriate for the period).

Consider- the Napoleanic times were right after that in Europe- perfect for wargames and for games obsessed with pomp and circumstance.

What does the rugged colonial life offer? It's rather bland by comparison. It lacks the lawlessness and adventure of the wild west. It lacks the manners of Europe. Have you seen Colonial Gothic, however? http://rogue-games.net/games/Colonial-Gothic/ . The major board game themes I see from that period of history are also horror-- e.g. Touch of Evil. http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/35815/a-touch-of-evil-the-supernatural-game

[HippopotamusDundee]

What does the rugged colonial life offer? It's rather bland by comparison. It lacks the lawlessness and adventure of the wild west. It lacks the manners of Europe. Have you seen Colonial Gothic, however? http://rogue-games.net/games/Colonial-Gothic/ . The major board game themes I see from that period of history are also horror-- e.g. Touch of Evil. http://boardgamegeek.com/boardgame/35815/a-touch-of-evil-the-supernatural-game

I think the fact you used the word 'rugged' is telling in and of itself - colonial-era gaming offers a chance to tell narratives that are about some of the truths of frontier living (themes of man vs. the wilderness, first contact, taming the primal land, etc.) in a way that Wild West stories, which focus on themes of man vs. man, the nature of criminality and tension between the ideal of independent living and the reality of government rule, do not or cannot.

[LD]

The way you describe colonial gaming, it's similar to the other neglected era- Stone Age/Bronze Age.

http://rpg.drivethrustuff.com/product/115271/Anointed-Mantle-of-the-Gods
http://www.rpgnow.com/product_reviews_info.php?products_id=115271&reviews_id=94384
(from the New Gods of Mankind series: http://darkskullstudios.com/products/new-gods-handbook/).

And Pelgrane Press' Hill Folk, (Publishers of 13th Age and the Jack Vance RPG). http://www.pelgranepress.com/?cat=222

http://www.rpgnow.com/product/101850/Cavemaster-RPG   (pebbles...popular mechanic for stone age games).

Perhaps people don't care very much about these themes?

Or, they only care about those themes in-as-much as they are realized in games like Fallout, which really focus more on man v. man... although man v. nature has a side role.

[Steerpike]

The idea of nature and our conflict with it has been pretty prominent in fantasy - Tolkien, of course, is preoccupied with this conflict.  What strikes me about the colonial period is that it's not quite as suitable for the kind of myth-making that drives so much popular fiction - the rekindling of interest in Arthurian romance and medieval chivalry in the 19th century, for example, is tied up with British nationalism and imperialism, and one could argue that the Western is centrally concerned with negotiating ideas about individualism and the American dream. Arguably, the early colonial history of North America doesn't supply the same kind of mythic grist for the mill (until the founding fathers get on the scene, anyway!).

[Elemental_Elf]

I've always assumed the lack of Colonial-style settings was that:

1. You have to develop a lot of setting material for the various empires that are colonizing the new world, material that will not be directly used in game as often as material generated specifically for the colonies.

2. Guns. For some reason muskets are just not that popular in the pen and paper world. People just want to either start when guns are just arriving or well after they have been perfected.

3. The threat of feeling/being insensitive... Its hard to describe. I think people are hesitant to set a game in a world where the "white man" is conquering the "red man's" land. Even if you mask the concept behind a veil of "the humans are colonizing a new world filled with vicious orcs", it still feels vaguely offensive, in a way. I think this might be a chiefly American perception because if you move a few thousand miles to the south and have a setting where elvish conquistadors are beating down aztec-like lizardfolk, it does not feel as... Wrong/bad(?) as the former.

If you remove those equivocations, a colonial setting really is not that different than a normal D&D setting. Its about civilization expanding into the "empty" wilderness where, lo and behold, more primitive peoples dwell. Every time a group of adventurers clears out a cave full of goblins, they are in effect paving the way civilization's inevitable sprawl. Really the only difference is that you deal with separate colonies, rather than baronies and have a higher percentage of republics as compared to monarchies.

Side note, I don't really see a ton of Old West style games either. Many of the ones that do exist add in Steam Punk elements, thereby blending genres.