The Articles of Dragon: "Languages Rules Leave Lots of Room"

Issue #66 of Dragon (October 1982) includes several different articles related to fantasy languages and their use in Dungeons & Dragons adventures and campaigns. While not all of them are good, several are – or at least are interesting enough that I still remember them after all these years, which is why I'll be devoting a few more posts to them, including today's. The first of these interesting language articles is A.D. Rogan's "Language Rules Leave Lots of Room for Creativity in Your Campaign." It's not the most inspired title by any means, nor does it really convey much about its content. Nevertheless, it does, in my opinion, raise some good questions about languages in (A)D&D and provides some intriguing answers to them.

The first thing one needs to know about this article is it's primarily concerned with linguistics, specifically the connections between languages, their degree of mutual intelligibility, and what sort of information a given language is capable of conveying. That probably sounds hopelessly nerdy, even within the context of RPGs, and it probably is. For a kid like me, who was deeply interested in foreign languages and their development, this was catnip. Add in that Rogan's article includes language trees showing how he imagines some of the demihuman, humanoid, and monster languages relate to one another (and, in some cases, to human languages), I found it really enjoyable.

Consider this language tree, which I hope is at least somewhat legible:

Here, Rogan makes connections between Middle Elfin and the languages of elven subspecies, woodland and fairy creatures, and even the secret language of the Druids. As I said above, it's hopelessly nerdy stuff, but simply looking at this language tree tells me a lot about the author's own fantasy setting. Ultimately, that's what makes the article so remarkable: it illustrates how something as specific as languages and their interrelationships can help to define a fantasy setting. 

Of course, Rogan doesn't limit himself to examining language trees, cool as I found that as a kid. He also devotes quite a lot of time to looking at what the AD&D rules say or imply about languages, literacy, and similar questions. As it turns out, the rules say quite a lot about these topics, though rarely in a cohesive way. That makes sense, since most of the comments are scattered across multiple books, written over the course of several years. Further, these comments are usually, like so much in Dungeons & Dragons, ad hoc rules put together to deal with specific problems, like how many languages can a character speak and so forth. Rogan attempts to make sense of them all, or at least raise questions for each referee to consider as he makes his own fantasy setting.

Naturally, I don't agree with all of Rogan's answers. For example, he assumes that members of the monk class must be illiterate, because they are unable to make use of scrolls and lack the thief's read languages ability. That's a defensible, if odd, extrapolation of the AD&D rules and one I don't share. However, it is, in my view, a good illustration of the kinds of things a referee might want to consider as he tackles the question of languages and literacy in his campaign setting, especially if that setting is an original one of his own creation. This article is, therefore, a useful one with a lot of recommend it. As I've said a couple of times already, I thought pretty highly of it in my youth and found, in re-reading it, that it still holds up reasonably well.

Our Toughest Challenge Ever

As if to prove my point, last week's Dark Sun posts have generated a lot of interest, not to mention comments, which I appreciate. Here's another ad for the setting, this time from issue #173 of Dragon (September 1991), the same issue as the Brom cover I previously highlighted.

Looking at this advertisement, I have several thoughts:

• It's important to remember TSR's D&D novels were very successful for the company, so it's no surprise that the release of the Dark Sun boxed set would also see the release of a novel at the same time, in this case Verdant Passage by Troy Denning. Though I never read any of them, there would eventually be thirteen novels published for Dark Sun during the TSR era.
• Speaking of TSR, is that not the logo at the bottom right the ugliest the company ever had?
• Once again, we see this ad emphasizes that Dark Sun is "the toughest AD&D game campaign ever published." I can't help but wonder what this is about. Was there a perception at the time that TSR's other settings, like Dragonlance or the Forgotten Realms, were "easy" or otherwise inadequate to the tastes of AD&D fans? My recollection, albeit from more than three decades ago, was that the 2e era was concerned far more with "story" and similar things, so I wouldn't have expected much clamor for a "challenging" setting. Perhaps that's the explanation? Could it have been that there some segment of the game's fans who felt the game had strayed too much from its roots and wanted a setting where death was ever-present? I wish I knew.

Wulfwald Bundle of Holding

Most people who read this blog are probably already familiar with the Bundle of Holding, which offers limited-time sales of tabletop RPGs in PDF form at bargain prices, with a portion of the revenue going to various charities. It's a great way to take a chance on a game or game line that interests you without having to blow a huge amount of money to do so. I've made use of it a few times myself and have never regretted it.

That's why I wanted to draw your attention to a new one that I think many readers will appreciate: Wulfwald. It's a low-fantasy, old school RPG inspired by Anglo-Saxon myths and legends. I bought a print copy of the game a couple of weeks ago and love it. I'm in the midst of writing a review for it, which I hope to have finished before I leave for Gamehole Con next week. However, the sale only runs until October 17 and I wanted to alert everyone to it now, in the event I don't complete that review before I depart.

For only $5.95, you get all five rulebooks in PDF form, along with an electronic black-and-white regional map of the game world drawn by the late, great Russ Nicholson. At that price, I think it's more than worth it and I highly recommend it to anyone fascinated by early medieval Britain.

The Darkest Shadows

Whatever one's feelings about the setting itself, Gerald Brom's artwork for Dark Sun was truly stunning. Take, for example, this piece which appeared on the cover of issue #173 of Dragon (September 1991), one month before the formal release of the boxed set. The issue featured a number of different articles intended to introduce Athas to the magazine's readers, but, for me, this cover image probably did more to sell me on Dark Sun than did any of those articles.

Character Trees

I hadn't intended to devote so many posts to Dark Sun, but they've proven quite popular and have generated a lot of discussion, so I thought I'd do a few more that I think have a wider relevance for fans of old school roleplaying games. In its advertising, TSR frequently described the world of Athas as AD&D's "toughest challenge ever." This train of thought can found throughout the boxed set's rulebook as well, such as this paragraph:

This paragraph appears under the section header "Character Trees," which continues:

Since it's been so long since I last read Dark Sun, I'd completely forgotten about the existence of character trees. When I re-read this section, I immediately thought of Goodman Games's Dungeon Crawl Classics Role Playing Game and its "character funnel." 

For those of you unfamiliar with a character funnel, it's an adventure for DCC RPG in which each player generates four 0-level characters to throw at its dangers. At the conclusion of the adventure, the player chooses which of these four – assuming any survived – to elevate to level 1 and become his player character. DCC is dangerous, even for characters of levels 1 and above; it's especially dangerous for level 0 characters. Consequently, many of them die during the course of a funnel and it's not at all uncommon for a player to have to generate a second (or third ...) set of four characters to get through the funnel with one still alive at the end. 

I've played through several funnels and they're a lot of fun. They're a great way to introduce new players to Dungeon Crawl Classics – not just its game mechanics but also its embracing of randomness as a gateway for unexpected fun. The other thing I really like about funnels is that I never know which of my four level 0 characters is going to be the one that makes it out alive. Often, it's the one I least expect, which I find delightful. Left to my own devices, I tend to fall into the same old ruts when it comes to generating a new character. Leaving the final decision to Fate breaks me free of that.

Now, Dark Sun's character tree concept is actually quite different from DCC's character funnel, but I nevertheless wondered if maybe there'd be some influence. The character tree is intended to provide players with a source of back-up characters whose levels are not too far below those of their current characters. This is a concern because the world of Athas is a dangerous one, player characters will die often. Since no one wants to replace a higher-level character with a 1st-level one, having three others as part of a tree is insurance against that. 

A player in Dark Sun may only play one character in his tree at a time. The other three are inactive and may only be activated between adventures, upon the death of the current character, or – rarely – during an adventure. Only the current characters gains experience points. However, upon the current character's gaining a level, one of the other three characters in the tree also goes up a level as well. This happens every time any played character in the tree advances. Ideally, the player will be swapping between characters, thereby ensuring that most of them are within a level or two of each other. Even if he doesn't, at least one of them should be fairly close to the level of his current character, thereby obviating the need to generate a new level 1 character.

I think there's something to the idea of a character tree, though it's really only needed if the referee is a stickler about requiring that a new character enter the campaign at level 1 without exception. It's been my experience that most referees are fairly flexible about this, though strict, by-the-book AD&D, even in the 2e era, discourages this practice. I've generally been more inclined to let replacement characters begin at or close to the average level of the remaining ones, but maybe I'm too lenient. I'd be curious to hear others' opinions about this, especially if they're based on experience born of play in a campaign.

The Dawn of a New World

Here's another teaser advertisement for Dark Sun, from Dragon #172 (August 1991) – a month before the formal release of the game. What stands out to me about this ad is that it calls the setting AD&D's "toughest challenge ever" or some variation thereof. This makes me wonder more about the genesis of the setting within TSR and what segment of the game's audience the company was hoping to attract.

A Drama of Unparalleled Heroics Unfolds

The second teaser advertisement for Dark Sun, this one appearing in issue #171 of Dragon (July 1991).

Coming This Fall ....

From issue #170 of Dragon (June 1991), the first of several teaser advertisements for the Dark Sun campaign setting.

Retrospective: Dark Sun

Having devoted last week's Retrospective post to The Complete Psionics Handbook, my thoughts inevitably turned to 1991's Dark Sun campaign setting – a setting specifically created to provide a place for Second Edition AD&D fans to make full use of the game's new psionics rules without having to worry about the potentially adverse effects these psychic powers might have on, say, the Forgotten Realms or the World of Greyhawk. 

Designed by Timothy B. Brown and Troy Denning, Dark Sun was presented as "a world ravaged by sorcery" and "the most challenging AD&D game world yet." This new setting took inspiration from both the post-apocalyptic and Dying Earth sub-genres, with a dash of Burroughsian sword-and-planet for good measure. Dark Sun was thus a significant departure from the vanilla fantasy of traditional D&D and AD&D. This departure wasn't just in terms of its content, but also its presentation, making ample use of the dark, edgy art of Gerald Brom and Thomas Baxa, two relative newcomers to TSR's stable of artists, who, together, created an esthetic for Dark Sun that clearly differentiated it from everything the company had previously done. 

Like all of TSR's settings for Second Edition, Dark Sun was released in a large, boxed set, filled to the brim with gaming materials. The two main components of the set were 96-page softcover books. The first of these, entitled simply "Rules Booklet," presented new and altered AD&D rules for use with the setting. The second, "The Wanderer's Journal," was an in-character presentation of the "arid and bleak" world of Athas, which is "beset by political strife and monstrous abominations, where life is grim and short." Also included was a 16-page booklet, "A Little Knowledge," which consists mostly of a short story but also includes details of an adventure. The adventure proper is presented in two small 24-page, spiralbound flip books, one of which has illustrations to show players, like those in Tomb of Horrors or Expedition to the Barrier Peaks. Also included are poster maps of the city-state of Tyr and the region in which it's situated, known as the Tablelands.

Before getting on to the actual content of the boxed set, I'd like to say a little more about its presentation. Dark Sun is an impressive package. I remember when I got copy of it, being quite taken aback not only by how much was included in the set, but also by the unique format it took. This was particularly true in the case of the flipbooks, something I'd never seen previously in an AD&D product (or indeed any RPG product that I can recall). I suspect that they were intended as something of an experiment by TSR, one that carried over into most of the adventures subsequently published for the setting. I never really warmed to this format, which was in my experience quite unwieldy, which is one of the reasons I didn't buy any of those adventures. I'll get to the other reason shortly.

Athas itself is a very imaginative and engaging setting – sort of a cross between Barsoom and Zothique. As presented in "The Wanderer's Journal," the world's history is fragmentary at best. All that is certain is that present-day Athas is a shadow of its former self, its land ravaged by sorcery run amok and littered with the ruins of happier, more sophisticated times. Now, Athasian civilization is centered around scattered city-states, each ruled by an immortal sorcerer-king, who protects his subjects from the dangers of the wasteland in return for utter obedience. The sorcerer-kings also war amongst themselves, each attempting to expand his control of the Tablelands at the expense of his rivals, while various factions within and without attempt to take advantage of the situation. 

Though intended for use with AD&D 2e, Dark Sun makes many changes to the standard rules and assumptions of the game. Though all of the usual AD&D races are available, many are changed significantly, like the halflings, who are wild, feral beings reputed to engage in cannibalism. Joining them are new races, like muls (half-human/half-dwarf hybrids bred for their hardiness), half-giants, and thri-kreen. Character classes are similarly affected, with all being changed (or outright disallowed, like the paladin) in some way. Wizards, for example, must decide whether to increase their power by employing defiling magic that destroys the environment – the reason Athas is now barren – while clerics serve not gods, which don't exist in this setting, but the elemental forces of nature. 

Psionics also play a major role in Athas, with psionicists being common throughout the setting's population. Most intelligent beings – and many unintelligent ones, like monsters – are able to wield the powers of the mind. Psionics is, in many ways, more important in Dark Sun than is magic, though both have their place. In fact, magic and psionics can be employed together and it's explained that the sorcerer-kings owe their power and immortality to being able to wield both. "The Wanderer's Journal" suggests in various places that the relationship between magic and psionics played some sort of role in the ancient apocalypse that laid waste to Athas, thereby setting up a mystery that would be explored in later supplements and adventures.

This is where, in my opinion, Dark Sun faltered. The adventures produced for it all centered around major events within the setting, like the slave revolt that overthrows the sorcerer-king of Tyr and establishes it as a free city. Later adventures build upon these events, further changing and altering the setting as Big Things happen in accordance with a plan established by TSR. This isn't an inherently terrible way of developing a setting, though it's not my preference. However, what made it frustrating was that many of the setting's big events, like the aforementioned defeat of the sorcerer-king, are the result of actions by named NPCs, not the player characters. Furthermore, some of these events even happen in the pages of tie-in novels rather than adventures – a testament, I suppose, of just how popular and lucrative AD&D novels were in those days.

It's a pity, because Dark Sun is a genuinely imaginative and unique take on fantasy. Athas is a great setting, one with lots of possibilities for adventure, as well as a style and feel that differs from everything else that TSR was producing at the time. I was blown away by Dark Sun when I first bought it and really wanted to run a campaign with it. That never happened, for many reasons, but a big one was that I worried that TSR would, through its adventures or novels, derail whatever it was I had in mind with their event-driven releases. To be fair, the company did the same to the Forgotten Realms as well, but the Realms had the benefit of being standard fantasy and thus there was little need for any official guidance on how to use it. Athas, being new and different, would have benefited immensely from some better adventure material to aid referees looking to make use of the setting.

This is why Dark Sun will always be, for me, "the one that got away" – a fantasy setting that could have been fantastic and groundbreaking but instead never really achieved its full potential. A shame!

The Articles of Dragon: "Thieves' Cant: A Primer"

A great weakness of mine is constructed languages. While I can't say for certain – there's always the possibility that something else is to blame – I think it's quite likely that Appendices E and F of The Lord of the Rings planted the seeds of this lifelong fascination. I spent an inordinate amount of time reading those sections at the back of The Return of the King, especially the pages that displayed the Tengwar and the Angerthas. Likewise, when I got hold of The Silmarillion, I paid special attention to its appendix about Quenya and Sindarin names. Along with an old Random House Dictionary of the English Language, whose inside covers had diagrams of the evolution of Latin script, these books pretty much ensured I'd be a conlang nerd for the rest of my life. 

Consequently, I always took great interest in language-related articles in Dragon or other RPG periodicals. Issue #66 (October 1982) featured several of these, all of which left a lasting impression on me. The first, which I'll discuss in this post, was ""Thieves' Cant: A primer for the language of larceny" by Aurelio Locsin. It's a fairly short article that is presented as a document from a fantasy setting detailing the grammar and vocabulary of Thieves' Cant, the secret language of thieves from Dungeons & Dragons. 

Now, Thieves' Cant had, prior to this point, never, so far as I know, been described at any length in any D&D product. The AD&D Players Handbook merely calls it thieves' "own language" and says nothing more about it. I suspect it was on this basis that Locsin formed his ideas about how to approach creating a Thieves' Cant language for use with the game. He wanted to come up with something that had all the features of a "real" language – nouns, pronouns, modifiers, verbs and tenses, etc. – while still being simple enough that it didn't require a degree in linguistics to understand, let alone make use of it.

Of course, that's the crux of it: how were you supposed to use Thieves' Cant? What was its purpose? The article itself, as I said, is short and is presented in a detached, quasi-academic way, as if written by a scholar or linguist from within a fantasy setting, who's now sharing this secret language with the reader. There's, therefore, not even a sidebar or bit of boxed text hinting at how players or Dungeon Masters might make use of this constructed language in their adventures or campaigns. Instead, it's simply described, complete with a section in the center of the magazine that's supposed to be removed and then cut and folded to produce a 32-page two-way pocket dictionary of the language.

Another equally frustrating issue with the article is its very basis. Locsin's vision of Thieves' Cant is of an actual language, with its own distinct grammar and vocabulary, just as Elvish or Orcish would have their own distinct elements. This seems completely wrongheaded to me. Historically, thieves, criminals, and other outcasts have had their own unique ways of communicating with one another – you know, a cant or jargon that's known primarily by other members of group in question. There are innumerable examples of this in the real world and very few of them were created from the ground up by inventing a new grammar and vocabulary. It seems highly unlikely that Thieves' Cant would be an exception.

As I recall, the reaction to this article, both in the letters column of future issues and in later articles about languages in D&D, was not positive. I can't say that I disagree with those reactions. Re-reading the article in preparation for writing this post reminded me of just how weird and ultimately useless it is. I hate saying that, because it's clear Locsin put some effort into inventing the grammar and vocabulary, but I'm still left wondering why? What did he think would be done with the language? Heck, what did he do with the language in his own campaigns? Had he written about that, even a little, it might well have improved the article's utility. As it is, "Thieves' Cant: A primer for the language of larceny" is just an oddity and nothing more.

Fortunately, I have better things to say about this issue's other articles about language.