Thoughts on skin complexion

[Steerpike]

[blockquote=Kindling]In the context of this discussion, I'm curious as to what people's thoughts are on published settings such as Nyambe: African Adventures or Legend of the Five Rings, which are intentionally - but perhaps somewhat ham-fistedly (or so it seems to me from what little I know of them) - rejecting the Eurocentrism of conventional fantasy settings. [/blockquote]If the setting were created simply to be different from Eurocentric fantasy, I find that a little silly, like the setting has a chip on its shoulder.  However, I'm definitely all for variation in fantasy and for breaking out of moulds that are getting a little cliched.  If the setting chosen was chosen because it would make a good setting, that's good enough for me.  As the creator says on the Nyambe site:
[blockquote=Christopher Dolunt]"My motivation for creating Nyambe was simple. Africa was a major part of the Earth that has little or no representation in fantasy literature, let alone RPGs. When it does appear, it usually follows the pulp fiction model: steaming jungles, bloodthirsty cannibals, and dark gods long forgotten by the civilized races. Of course, historical Africa was nothing like that, so my goal for Nyambe was to create a fantasy version of Africa based on the actual history and mythology of Africa, rather than previous fantasy depictions. So, I went about taking snippets of history or myth, and twisting them, adding fantasy elements or changing specifics to make them fit into an OGL world."[/blockquote]
Now, whether or not Nyambe is a good setting or not, I don't know.  It's possible it comes off as a little too insistent on the African theme, in a way that Eurocentric fantasy might not feel it has to.  But for all I know it could be quite brilliant.  Being set in Africa doesn't count for or against it, in my opinion...

[LordVreeg]

[blockquote=Steerpike][blockquote=Kindling]In the context of this discussion, I'm curious as to what people's thoughts are on published settings such as Nyambe: African Adventures or Legend of the Five Rings, which are intentionally - but perhaps somewhat ham-fistedly (or so it seems to me from what little I know of them) - rejecting the Eurocentrism of conventional fantasy settings. [/blockquote]
If the setting were created simply to be different from Eurocentric fantasy, I find that a little silly, like the setting has a chip on its shoulder. However, I'm definitely all for variation in fantasy and for breaking out of moulds that are getting a little cliched. If the setting chosen was chosen because it would make a good setting, that's good enough for me. [/blockquote]
Carthage and Persia get the Shaft in the traditional western civ ideal, it's true.  There is some valaue to taking another look at the cultures that were maionly portrayed as the enemies of Greece and Rome, as powerful foils.

I remember placing the idea of a roughly Byzantine feel to one of my areas, and an Ottoman feel to another, I think this happenned after a rather escellent history course back in College.

Also, to be more direct in my answer to Kindling's query, there is a grey area between a more fair, complete look at history and the following revisions and the same revisionism with underlying motive...they can sound very similar at first.  History is a continual conversation between the past and the present.  The same motivations are the issue with the question.

[Kindling]

As I said above, I think I chose my words wrongly in my original post asking for opinions on Nyambe and L5R - I didn't mean to put the focus so much on the idea that they might be "rejecting" eurocentrism per se, but just wondered how people viewed such settings that were just as afrocentric or japanocentric as Greyhawk (or whatever) is euroentric... as I said I don't know a huge load about either Nyambe or L5R but they seem from the little I've read to be to be just moving standard D&D around geographically (not that there's anything implicitly wrong with that)

[sparkletwist]

I agree with Steerpike. If it's just "hey, most settings are based on Europe, let's base ours on Africa/Asia just to be different and not base ours on Europe," that's fine, but there has to be something interesting in the setting, and it has to feel like it's based on Africa. I'd hope and expect that the traditional races, monsters, cultures, and such were replaced with something more suited to African or Asian traditions. If they do that, it may have a lot less of a "just moving D&D around" feel, because then it's essentially doing what the originators of Eurocentric fantasy did, only in an African/Asian context. What would not work nearly as well would be to simply try to shoehorn the traditional D&D races, monsters, and whatnot into the new context. Unfortunately, I fear many D&D players would be disappointed if the setting had no equivalent of dwarves, for example. Of course, I've never looked inside Nyambe or L5R, so I have no idea which approach they took. I do remember the old "Oriental Aventures" book, which did pretty much just try to shoehorn traditional D&D into Asian myth (or the other way around, if you prefer) and it wasn't so great...

[Polycarp]

If it's just "hey, most settings are based on Europe, let's base ours on Africa/Asia just to be different and not base ours on Europe," that's fine, but there has to be something interesting in the setting, and it has to feel like it's based on Africa.

different[/i], but it shouldn't seem like it's different on purpose.

This is a weird position to put an author in.  Why isn't wanting to be different enough motivation?  I put things in my settings all the time "just to be different."  Now, the fact that something is original or different doesn't make it good, but I freely admit to seeking new and original ideas just for the sake of being original.  Isn't that what creativity is?

If the setting were created simply to be different from Eurocentric fantasy, I find that a little silly, like the setting has a chip on its shoulder. However, I'm definitely all for variation in fantasy and for breaking out of moulds that are getting a little cliched. If the setting chosen was chosen because it would make a good setting, that's good enough for me.
...
Now, whether or not Nyambe is a good setting or not, I don't know. It's possible it comes off as a little too insistent on the African theme, in a way that Eurocentric fantasy might not feel it has to.  But for all I know it could be quite brilliant. Being set in Africa doesn't count for or against it, in my opinion...

There is a similar tension here.  You're all for breaking molds, but perceive someone who actively attempts to break molds a having "a chip on their shoulder."  It's almost as if the author is expected to break molds by accident: The author, in search of great setting material, just happens to stumble upon some African mythology and decides it would make a great addition.  But if the author thinks "I would like to base this particular culture/setting on African mythology" and then goes and does his research, it's somehow not as good.

When people on this site talk about finding inspiration, they often state that a certain culture is based on a "Persian" or "Byzantine" (etc.) motif, or maybe some mix of several real-world traditions and mythologies.  We do this because it conveys ideas and feelings, but we also do it to explore the interesting points of new cultures that we may not have worked with or played in before.  Is this silly?  Again, what's wrong with being different for the sake of being different?

[Steerpike]

I guess the way I see it is that being original and breaking moulds is always good, but doesn't always guarantee the work itself is going to be good simply because it avoids cliches, in the same way that a Eurocentric setting isn't automatically bad because it employs some of them.  What I was trying to get at (probably very ineloquently) is that I can imagine certain settings resting too heavily on their different-ness rather than on qualities a more "traditional" setting might focus on (detailed, versimilar societies or history for example, or interesting narrative threads).

I suppose in essence my point is that I'm always all for variation and breaking down the idea of a default setting/mythology, just not at the expense of quality in other arenas.  Having read a bit more of Nyambe, it doesn't seem to sacrifice anything, so it avoids the pitfall I described.  Nothing wrong with being different for the sake of being different, so long as "different" isn't all that the setting is constituted by.  Does that make sense?

[sparkletwist]

If it's just "hey, most settings are based on Europe, let's base ours on Africa/Asia just to be different and not base ours on Europe," that's fine, but there has to be something interesting in the setting, and it has to feel like it's based on Africa.

different[/i], but it shouldn't seem like it's different on purpose.

This is a weird position to put an author in.  Why isn't wanting to be different enough motivation?  I put things in my settings all the time "just to be different."  Now, the fact that something is original or different doesn't make it good, but I freely admit to seeking new and original ideas just for the sake of being original.  Isn't that what creativity is?[/quote]feel[/i] different. If it just plays like normal D&D with mostly black people instead of mostly white people, that's not an African setting, that's normal D&D where the characters look different. That's why I mentioned "Oriental Adventures"-- it was less of an Asian setting, and more of regular D&D, only with Asians. I should also clarify, I'm not saying that Nyambe does that, because I don't know anything about Nyambe.

[Polycarp]

this recent thread[/url], for instance), and it often leads to good material.

What I think is unfortunate is that the more obscure the source (that is, "obscure" in relation to medieval Europe and "standard" fantasy), the greater the burden that seems to be placed on fantasy authors to prove that they aren't just "being original for the sake of being original," which usually comes with the insinuation that the author isn't focused on quality because he's too busy being different or politically correct (I am, by the way, not saying that anyone here made this insinuation, it's just that I have seen it go hand in hand with the "being original for the sake of originality" allegation many times).  It's a double standard, and one that has the potential to discourage people from exploring new sources and producing good work.

Simply saying "Hey, my setting is based on Africa instead of Europe! Look how different that is!" isn't enough, it has to actually feel different. If it just plays like normal D&D with mostly black people instead of mostly white people, that's not an African setting, that's normal D&D where the characters look different. That's why I mentioned "Oriental Adventures"-- it was less of an Asian setting, and more of regular D&D, only with Asians.

I think I agree with that - though I haven't played either OA or Nyambe.  All I would say is that it's good to be open minded about these things.  It's easy to say "this is so unoriginal, it's just like medieval Europe" and be unaware that things you consider to be characteristically European - like, say, the feudal relationship between a monarch and an armed, landed nobility - actually appear in multiple other cultures around the world.  The way we decide if something "feels different" often hinges on these preconceptions we have about what is "European" and what is "foreign," which sometimes leads us to expect an 'authenticity' that isn't really authentic.

[Elemental_Elf]

Simply saying "Hey, my setting is based on Africa instead of Europe! Look how different that is!" isn't enough, it has to actually feel different. If it just plays like normal D&D with mostly black people instead of mostly white people, that's not an African setting, that's normal D&D where the characters look different. That's why I mentioned "Oriental Adventures"-- it was less of an Asian setting, and more of regular D&D, only with Asians.

The 3.5 oriental Adventures WAS a good attempt at bring the Western-centric design of D&D into an Asian setting with out designing a completely new system. Personally I think the book's biggest failing was that it embraced too much of Asia and didn't focus enough on what people really wanted - an amalgam of Feudal Japan and pre-Qing-Dynasty China. It's failure to really capture that feel is what leads many down the path of 'its just D&D with a asian people.' Personally, I think the book is solid enough to be a great jumping off point for anyone who wants to construct an 'Oriental' setting and if player's complain about it feeling too much like an Asian gloss on a 'Western' setting, then they only have their DM to blame.  

[LordVreeg]

Again, what this (and many) threads boil down to is the treatment of culture, and the attempt to simulate hundreds or thousands of years of interwoven interaction and the resultant effects of same in game, rule, and setting-speak.

Also, due to the way cultures treat caste and social class, as well as family and wealth, many rulesets and games will be over whelmed and the attempt to do something different for the setting becomes more obviously two dimensional.  Polycarp's note about something feeling different ties into this, in that a ruleset and setting made with depth, that ties the crunch to the fluff of the different cultural situation will be the only way this will succeed in feeling right, and for people looking for (subconsiously or consiously) certain touchpoints that are missing, the game might still feel wrong.