Jack7
First Post
ESSAYS ON GAME DESIGN
Essay Nine: Where Has All the History Gone?
On Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances
Synopsis: Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances form a vital part of human history and culture. Yet they are often overlooked or ignored either intentionally or unintentionally in game, milieu, and character development to the detriment of the overall game design. Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances should take their natural place in-game as important and fundamental aspects of game and character development in role-play games.
This essay is part of the series’ Essays on Game Design. It is, however, like the short essay, Where Has All the Magic Gone, too broad in scope to be presented within the boundaries of that other thread. So I have instead posted it here as a separate thread.
Interactive Essay – This thread is also an Interactive Essay. See link for an explanation of what this means.
Part One: There are three aspects of human life that are common to many cultures (but most especially to most of the Western cultures and countries that were the basis of the basic idea behind the D&D fantasy game settings and milieus) throughout the world that I think are conspicuously missing in many fantasy role play games. These three aspects of human life (and it seems to me that at least one of these absent aspects would likely also be common to Western based non-human fantasy races, such as Elves and Dwarves) missing from the game are those very things so often mentioned in both real world history, and in folk and fairy tales, legend, and myth. Those three things are what we today call heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances.
Now not all three seem to be missing from every fantasy based role playing game (though most all are missing to some degree from most such games), and indeed heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances could be equally applied as important factors in Pulp games, Western games, Sci-Fi games, Mystery and Horror games, and even to some extent Detective and Military and/or Espionage based games. But in the field of fantasy, at the very least, things like heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances should be stressed as a far more important general aspect of role play gaming, not to mention general character development than is currently the case. Because in real life people often passed between different generations, not to mention among various same generation family members and friends and associates, heirloom objects, matters of personal and family legacy, and inheritances (due to premature death by war, exploration, accident, misadventure, or disease) as a common matter of course and cultural practice. (At this point I won’t even mention things like family and personal blessings and birthrights, but they too weigh as a form of inheritance or legacy. And such things as these were often of extreme importance to our ancestors. More so often than physical inheritances.)
However, in fantasy gaming these important aspects of human life and relationship are often entirely missing from personal matters of (character) interaction, or perhaps more importantly from the developmental background of how characters become created, established and are evolved. Think to your own family for just a moment, especially if you live in most Western cultures (thought that is definitely not a necessary precondition), and ask yourself, have you or another family member not directly received, benefitted, or befitted yourself from the legacy, inheritances, or heirloom objects of your family and ancestors?
It is as if, in most fantasy games, a character is considered pre-developed with no history but his individual self, as if he or she sprang like Athena from the forehead of Zeus without any prior progeneration or ancestral ties, responsibilities, or inheritance of any kind. Without a real background, or relationship to their own historical legacy. Yet even Athena inherited the Aegis. Even she drew wisdom, insight, and wealth from her father’s legacy. But for most fantasy based gaming characters it is as if the common and assumed practice of character creation is of a person completely devoid of family history, inheritance, legacy, and background. In all practical effect orphaned by and within the world they inhabit. And with nothing of real value to effectively describe and define their past.
Yes, I am aware that character creation often considers or expresses a sort of loosely sketched and generalized “background story.” At least in theory or in part. Meaning that I, the character, came from this or that town, had this or that general background, my parents may have been named so and so, and I may have an older brother or sister. But that is usually the extent of character background development (at least initially so, and in many games), aside from the usual gaming demands of establishing the attributes of Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, or whatever (other) abilities are practiced and measured in-game. But little, if any, attention is ever given to matters such as “what was passed on to me by my family or friends,” “what did I inherit of importance,” or “what was the legacy left me by my family, for good or ill, or for both?” Indeed I could find no mention at all of the terms heirloom, legacy, or inheritance in any of the First Edition, Third Edition, or Fourth Edition D&D books (I cannot speak about Second Edition having never played it, but the other editions are, I think it would be agreed the basic framework of what are usually considered the most important or at least most popular fantasy RPGs), a seemingly strange omission if one stops to think but a moment on the matter. And in only a couple of cases were concerns involving heirlooms, legacies, or inheritances even vaguely, briefly, or indirectly mentioned or implied in relationship to character, setting, or game creation and development.
(I fully understand that many individual games and settings, such as private homebrew efforts, do consider play aspects such as heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances. And that is well and good. However such factors are rarely considered systematically even in individual settings or milieus, and in this case I am not really talking about individual settings or private homebrew efforts. I am encouraging game developers and writers to include these important aspects of human, and likely demi-human, cultures and societies within the formal structure of their work. That is, as a matter of real and inherent game structure. For indeed as both Medieval and Modern societies often show considerable considerations regarding heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of great family, clan, personal, legal, societal, and cultural importance it seems a strange oversight (or is that not truly more of an undersight) to omit them from the body and structure of role play games. So game writers and developers should pay far more attention to matters involving heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances than is often the case. This is true when developing games whose genres include horror, pulp, modern, historical, and especially fantasy elements or settings. However even gaming genres involving historical war gaming and science fiction could probably benefit either directly or indirectly by the inclusion of elements regarding heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances.)
How many oral accounts and written records in human culture, how many folk tales, fictional stories, legends, and myths are built specifically around matters dealing with these important expressions of human life? Frodo inherits the heirloom of the One Ring, Arthur inherits the heirloom of Excalibur (not to mention his family legacy, which is then passed on to others), Harry Potter inherits his family’s dark past and future hope, the Sagas and Eddas are likewise filled with tales of inherited and rich objects, and so forth and so on. I could go on practically ad infinitum and ad nauseum. Need I even mention the numerous accounts of Greek and Roman (the Iliad and Odyssey, Jason and the Argonauts, the Aeneid), Scandinavian, Germanic, Celtic, Japanese, African, Indian (indeed, sources from around the world) myths and legends in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances play an important if not the most vital role in the development of an heroic character, clan, or culture? I could also mention numerous real world historical examples such as Attila and the Sword of War (Mars) and the White Stag, the legacy Augustus took up from Caesar, the generals who inherited the legacy of Alexander’s conquests, The Byzantine continuation of the legacies of Rome and the Orthodox church, the Muslim expansion of the legacy of ancient Greek and Roman science and engineering, the Judeo-Christian legacy and inheritance in Europe and the West, how modern societies have benefitted from the inherited scientific and technological legacies and heirlooms of the past, and on and on and on I could go citing example after example. As other illustrations of my meaning in a more direct and material sense just look to the Relics and Icons of religion, the heirloom Crown Jewels of government, the civil, court, and legitimacy claims of princes and kings, and to various other physical and cultural signs of authority and asserted rights and responsibilities. Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances abound throughout history as obvious indication of both grand and powerful physical objects, and of unresolved issues and concerns that continue to haunt men and the tribes, clans, families, societies, and cultures from which they have been generated and evolved. So, within the storied tales of myth, legend, fairy and folk tales, fiction both ancient and modern, and even within the hallowed halls of history records are replete with events in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of one kind or another shape and mold the course and sweep of both the character of individual men and women, and the movement and scope of history itself.
Yet within the game it seems as if most characters spring from the air, free of, and for the most part, completely divorced from and ignorant of the responsibilities, obligations, histories, legacies, inheritances, and heirlooms that make up the treasure horde of their family, community, and/or cultural background. Character background development is usually little more than a Spartan and anemic exercise in “naming and attribute rolling.” Some in-game characters, of course, will be orphans and urchins, doomed by fate or circumstance to have become separated from their natural background and antecedents, but most will be, as in real life, the product of where, and whence, and through whom they arose. Therefore, most will carry upon their person, seen or unseen, the marks, marques, and effects of their history. They will to a large extent be who they are because of whom and what has come before them.
(I have a personal theory as to why most games approach character background development as they do, as if it is an activity quite divorced from what would actually be entirely natural among most peoples, not to mention what is divorced from historical precedent, and natural to myth, legend, and fiction. And others can discuss this somewhat separate issue among themselves in this thread if they choose to do so. However, at this point let me merely say that whatever the reason or reasons, and I suspect more than one, the important point in this thread is that with game and character creation it is not so vital a matter as to why so many RPGs tend to so often lack real substance regarding background, as it simply is that they do.)
Therefore to correct this dearth of developmental potential, this lack of character legacy and substantiality, I suggest including three (you may suggest more, I am suggesting three) new facets of character and game background and development. These three facets of background being the Heirloom, the Legacy, and the Inheritance.
Part Two: At this point I think it would be entirely constructive to define the terms being employed and then to show how those terms could be (re)defined and employed in game terms.
1. Heirloom – An heirloom is any property that is considered by law or custom as inseparable from an inheritance and is inherited with that inheritance. It can also be defined as anything that has been within the possession of a family for generations, and as anything that is possessed by a family and that contains great sentimental, historical, and/or physical and monetary value.
2. Legacy – A gift of personal property by will. It is also generally understood by at least implication to be any aspect of inherited duty, responsibility, or occupation, and these more nebulous and immaterial aspects can also include conditional and often overlooked features of a family’s history, such as when it is said that a group of people have a "family legacy.” This implies that a family, or even an organization or group of people such as a Guild, has a particular interest or set of interests upon which they have devoted much time, resource, and energy. Such as the fact that some families have a legacy of charity work, science, religious devotion or calling, or industry.
3. Inheritance – An inheritance can include many things. Such as; Hereditary succession to a title or an office or property, or That which is inherited; a title or property or estate that passes by law to the heir on the death of the owner, or (genetics) attributes acquired via biological heredity from the parents, or simply, any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors. An inheritance can include anything from a famous family sword that has been passed from father to son, to inherited lands and estates, to money, to even something as seemingly immaterially unimportant, but psychologically valuable and vital, as a family blessing.
I have used fairly simple and straightforward definitions in describing these terms, but definitions that are complex enough to imply some of the rich possibilities inherent within the terms. For each term is similar in some respects to the other, and as to what is implied thereby, but different enough in individual character, definition, and potential to be of enormous value in developing new gaming ideas and prospects.
As for me personally I have been passed and obtained numerous family heirlooms, part of my family’s legacy (especially as regards science and technical and technological matters, not to mention matters like law enforcement and military history, – although I have rejected other parts of my family legacy, such as certain kinds of employment – I have often followed a very different employment and career track than most of my family), and inheritances, such as the family estate which I partially inherited and partially bought and renovated. I also expect to inherit more at some time in the future. In other words I am a living example of how these important matters manifest themselves in human life, and I suspect many of you, if not most of you, have been the beneficiaries of, in one way or another, family heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of your own.
Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can be employed with great value as both a method of overall game and campaign development, and as the method for the production of individual adventures and quests. In the case of game and campaign development heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide thematic background material for players and important NPCs alike. In the case then of developing individual adventure material heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide valuable story plotlines and story progression points so that the DM or GM can personalize the experience of individual characters for the benefit of both the player and the overall setting or milieu.
Now, on to the matter as to how these things could express themselves in game terms. There are many defintional ways in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can overlap or become expressions of one another. So for purposes of this essay I will ignore those occasions and definitions in which these three aspects of historical background can impede upon each other, or indeed, even become for all practical purposes mere variant expressions of the other terms. Instead for purposes of game and character development I shall concentrate upon the divisions and differences of these various terms in order to stress how each term is and can be unique in function and construction. In other words, I’m not going to discuss how an heirloom can be simply a form of material inheritance, but rather how an heirloom can be expressed differently in game terms from an inheritance. I have already defined these terms above (for purposes of this essay) and so won’t bother to redefine them again. Instead I will describe some, but not all, of the ways in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can be used in-game to develop, organize, and enrich those same games, settings, backgrounds, and milieus.
Heirlooms – Heirlooms can be used in-game as both social and personal value material objects, providing there is some deep and intimate connection between those generations or groups of people who possess them. Heirlooms can be either secret or obvious magical (or even technological) objects; they can contain within them other secret or hidden objects (such as keys or jewelry, or messages or gemstones), etc. Heirlooms can contain codes or even be codes in and of themselves. They can be inscribed with glyphs, magical scripts, or even with phrases from dead languages, or mathematical symbols and mysterious signs. Heirlooms can point the way to an undiscovered or long hidden set of ruins. Heirlooms can be long extinct tools or devices whose purpose has been lost over time but could possibly be resurrected or revised. Heirlooms can contain old family secrets or relay information about a covert multi-generational family occupation, avocation, or concern. Heirlooms can be disputed, either by members of the same family or group, or by outsiders who likewise lay claim to the object. Heirlooms can be full of secrets and otherwise unrecorded history. They can be relical or miraculous in nature. And, of course, they will be practically a’swim in great sentimental and kinship value. Heirlooms can and should be used as the background for stories, undiscovered history, and the future development of the characters of the various players.
Legacies – Legacies can display themselves in the forms of titles, occupations, historical events, mysteries, and Quests (formal or informal - of clan, group, nation, culture, or person). Indeed a Quest, especially a multi-generational one can often be a kind of legacy in itself. Legacies can sometimes involve events as large as the turning of the Worm or the passing of an Age, involving whole societies or cultures (Alexander Hellenizing Egypt, the Near East, and eventually that legacy being passed down to most of Europe in one way or another), or legacies can involve individual or family responsibilities and duties, personal governance, or private patronage and economy. A reputation can be inherited as a legacy, as well as can be a real object. A reputation of leadership and honor to be lived up to and mastered, or a legacy of cowardice and dishonor to be overcome and put down. Legacies offer a varied and robust type of inheritance, even if legacies are often subtle, deceptive, and cunning in all that they imply. A good legacy is a thing of great value, a poor or malignant legacy is a thing of great concern, and yet either is superior to no legacy at all. Especially within the confines of a fantasy world. Yet one should also remember this, the very act of living and acting allows one to further build upon the legacies of the past, or to reshape them, or even to create new ones when and where desired or necessary.
Inheritances – In describing inheritances I shall concentrate primarily upon material inheritances other than heirlooms. I have also already described legacies as a form of family, societal, cultural or non-material inheritance. So instead of revisiting those terms I’ll describe inheritances in primarily physical, material, monetary, and technical terms.
Inheritances are matters of real wealth, physical objects (other than heirlooms), real estate or estates, money, and treasures of all sorts. A friend, ally, or inferior may have given an object to an ancestor that became an heirloom, to be passed with honor between generations. But those same people, and others as well, may have given not objects of necessarily sentimental or personal value, but objects of material, monetary, or more mundane wealth. They may have given gemstones, gold, silver or other precious metals, well-wrought jewelry, money, rare objects, artwork, lands, estates, houses and homes, keeps, castles or fortifications, and various other possessions which are then passed on to the character in the form of an inheritance. Then again ancestors may have accumulated their treasure through their own desires, efforts, labor, luck, and work. In any case an inheritance is a form of great blessing for it provides material surety against some forms of misfortune (such as chronic poverty) and it allows the character the necessary economic power and prosperity to pursue various personal aims and interests. Furthermore an inheritance may be in nature immediate, or it may be delayed, it may be granted and willed by an ancestor or friend, or it may have to be earned through hard labor or dangerous enterprise. Inheritances can be, and often are, contested. Inheritances offer a wealth (pun certainly intended) of new possibilities for role-play, unusual adventure, hostility, and complex character development.
How to Use and Employ Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances – Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances do not have to be used crudely, or even immediately in order to benefit setting, campaign, adventure, and character development. They can be employed at any time. For instance upon returning home from an expedition or adventure a character might discover that his great uncle has unexpectedly left him a mysterious and unexplained heirloom. It is up to the character to discover the nature and purpose of the heirloom. Another character might inherit a number of heirlooms and family artifacts after his father’s death. A third character might discover that his family has a secret legacy involving the Grail, or was part of a movement or organization that he was previously completely unaware of. A fourth character might inherit an old mansion and estate, long abandoned, that he goes to occupy only to discover it has several secret passages and was the site of mysterious rites and bizarre conclaves.
The point is that there are many ways to make use of heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances, at least as many in-game as there are in real life. One need only employ a little imagination, or tap the fertile storehouses of legends, myths, fairy and folk tales, fiction, religion, or history.
And one does not need to employ heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances in all of the immediately obvious ways. A character might inherit an heirloom that sits idle and in hibernation for an entire campaign or more before something triggers it into action. A character might discover only bits and pieces of his family’s legacy over a great period of time, slowly piecing together the mystery of what it all means only with great effort and expense. A character might discoverer that his inheritance is one that must be earned through several dangerous adventures and labors, not merely granted by statement or will. He may also discover that what he expected to inherit is in fact quite different from what he actually inherits.
In any case heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide an ongoing source of role-play adventure, action, mystery, conflict, and intrigue. And perhaps most importantly they can be individually tailored to particular characters, lending an air of realism and real connection between game world, setting, milieu, and campaign, and the involved players and their various characters. In a role playing sense it is almost entirely advantageous to integrate heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances into any role play game, setting, or background, and a loss of real potential to fail to do so.
Essay Nine: Where Has All the History Gone?
On Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances
Synopsis: Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances form a vital part of human history and culture. Yet they are often overlooked or ignored either intentionally or unintentionally in game, milieu, and character development to the detriment of the overall game design. Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances should take their natural place in-game as important and fundamental aspects of game and character development in role-play games.
This essay is part of the series’ Essays on Game Design. It is, however, like the short essay, Where Has All the Magic Gone, too broad in scope to be presented within the boundaries of that other thread. So I have instead posted it here as a separate thread.
Interactive Essay – This thread is also an Interactive Essay. See link for an explanation of what this means.
Part One: There are three aspects of human life that are common to many cultures (but most especially to most of the Western cultures and countries that were the basis of the basic idea behind the D&D fantasy game settings and milieus) throughout the world that I think are conspicuously missing in many fantasy role play games. These three aspects of human life (and it seems to me that at least one of these absent aspects would likely also be common to Western based non-human fantasy races, such as Elves and Dwarves) missing from the game are those very things so often mentioned in both real world history, and in folk and fairy tales, legend, and myth. Those three things are what we today call heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances.
Now not all three seem to be missing from every fantasy based role playing game (though most all are missing to some degree from most such games), and indeed heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances could be equally applied as important factors in Pulp games, Western games, Sci-Fi games, Mystery and Horror games, and even to some extent Detective and Military and/or Espionage based games. But in the field of fantasy, at the very least, things like heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances should be stressed as a far more important general aspect of role play gaming, not to mention general character development than is currently the case. Because in real life people often passed between different generations, not to mention among various same generation family members and friends and associates, heirloom objects, matters of personal and family legacy, and inheritances (due to premature death by war, exploration, accident, misadventure, or disease) as a common matter of course and cultural practice. (At this point I won’t even mention things like family and personal blessings and birthrights, but they too weigh as a form of inheritance or legacy. And such things as these were often of extreme importance to our ancestors. More so often than physical inheritances.)
However, in fantasy gaming these important aspects of human life and relationship are often entirely missing from personal matters of (character) interaction, or perhaps more importantly from the developmental background of how characters become created, established and are evolved. Think to your own family for just a moment, especially if you live in most Western cultures (thought that is definitely not a necessary precondition), and ask yourself, have you or another family member not directly received, benefitted, or befitted yourself from the legacy, inheritances, or heirloom objects of your family and ancestors?
It is as if, in most fantasy games, a character is considered pre-developed with no history but his individual self, as if he or she sprang like Athena from the forehead of Zeus without any prior progeneration or ancestral ties, responsibilities, or inheritance of any kind. Without a real background, or relationship to their own historical legacy. Yet even Athena inherited the Aegis. Even she drew wisdom, insight, and wealth from her father’s legacy. But for most fantasy based gaming characters it is as if the common and assumed practice of character creation is of a person completely devoid of family history, inheritance, legacy, and background. In all practical effect orphaned by and within the world they inhabit. And with nothing of real value to effectively describe and define their past.
Yes, I am aware that character creation often considers or expresses a sort of loosely sketched and generalized “background story.” At least in theory or in part. Meaning that I, the character, came from this or that town, had this or that general background, my parents may have been named so and so, and I may have an older brother or sister. But that is usually the extent of character background development (at least initially so, and in many games), aside from the usual gaming demands of establishing the attributes of Strength, Intelligence, Wisdom, or whatever (other) abilities are practiced and measured in-game. But little, if any, attention is ever given to matters such as “what was passed on to me by my family or friends,” “what did I inherit of importance,” or “what was the legacy left me by my family, for good or ill, or for both?” Indeed I could find no mention at all of the terms heirloom, legacy, or inheritance in any of the First Edition, Third Edition, or Fourth Edition D&D books (I cannot speak about Second Edition having never played it, but the other editions are, I think it would be agreed the basic framework of what are usually considered the most important or at least most popular fantasy RPGs), a seemingly strange omission if one stops to think but a moment on the matter. And in only a couple of cases were concerns involving heirlooms, legacies, or inheritances even vaguely, briefly, or indirectly mentioned or implied in relationship to character, setting, or game creation and development.
(I fully understand that many individual games and settings, such as private homebrew efforts, do consider play aspects such as heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances. And that is well and good. However such factors are rarely considered systematically even in individual settings or milieus, and in this case I am not really talking about individual settings or private homebrew efforts. I am encouraging game developers and writers to include these important aspects of human, and likely demi-human, cultures and societies within the formal structure of their work. That is, as a matter of real and inherent game structure. For indeed as both Medieval and Modern societies often show considerable considerations regarding heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of great family, clan, personal, legal, societal, and cultural importance it seems a strange oversight (or is that not truly more of an undersight) to omit them from the body and structure of role play games. So game writers and developers should pay far more attention to matters involving heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances than is often the case. This is true when developing games whose genres include horror, pulp, modern, historical, and especially fantasy elements or settings. However even gaming genres involving historical war gaming and science fiction could probably benefit either directly or indirectly by the inclusion of elements regarding heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances.)
How many oral accounts and written records in human culture, how many folk tales, fictional stories, legends, and myths are built specifically around matters dealing with these important expressions of human life? Frodo inherits the heirloom of the One Ring, Arthur inherits the heirloom of Excalibur (not to mention his family legacy, which is then passed on to others), Harry Potter inherits his family’s dark past and future hope, the Sagas and Eddas are likewise filled with tales of inherited and rich objects, and so forth and so on. I could go on practically ad infinitum and ad nauseum. Need I even mention the numerous accounts of Greek and Roman (the Iliad and Odyssey, Jason and the Argonauts, the Aeneid), Scandinavian, Germanic, Celtic, Japanese, African, Indian (indeed, sources from around the world) myths and legends in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances play an important if not the most vital role in the development of an heroic character, clan, or culture? I could also mention numerous real world historical examples such as Attila and the Sword of War (Mars) and the White Stag, the legacy Augustus took up from Caesar, the generals who inherited the legacy of Alexander’s conquests, The Byzantine continuation of the legacies of Rome and the Orthodox church, the Muslim expansion of the legacy of ancient Greek and Roman science and engineering, the Judeo-Christian legacy and inheritance in Europe and the West, how modern societies have benefitted from the inherited scientific and technological legacies and heirlooms of the past, and on and on and on I could go citing example after example. As other illustrations of my meaning in a more direct and material sense just look to the Relics and Icons of religion, the heirloom Crown Jewels of government, the civil, court, and legitimacy claims of princes and kings, and to various other physical and cultural signs of authority and asserted rights and responsibilities. Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances abound throughout history as obvious indication of both grand and powerful physical objects, and of unresolved issues and concerns that continue to haunt men and the tribes, clans, families, societies, and cultures from which they have been generated and evolved. So, within the storied tales of myth, legend, fairy and folk tales, fiction both ancient and modern, and even within the hallowed halls of history records are replete with events in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of one kind or another shape and mold the course and sweep of both the character of individual men and women, and the movement and scope of history itself.
Yet within the game it seems as if most characters spring from the air, free of, and for the most part, completely divorced from and ignorant of the responsibilities, obligations, histories, legacies, inheritances, and heirlooms that make up the treasure horde of their family, community, and/or cultural background. Character background development is usually little more than a Spartan and anemic exercise in “naming and attribute rolling.” Some in-game characters, of course, will be orphans and urchins, doomed by fate or circumstance to have become separated from their natural background and antecedents, but most will be, as in real life, the product of where, and whence, and through whom they arose. Therefore, most will carry upon their person, seen or unseen, the marks, marques, and effects of their history. They will to a large extent be who they are because of whom and what has come before them.
(I have a personal theory as to why most games approach character background development as they do, as if it is an activity quite divorced from what would actually be entirely natural among most peoples, not to mention what is divorced from historical precedent, and natural to myth, legend, and fiction. And others can discuss this somewhat separate issue among themselves in this thread if they choose to do so. However, at this point let me merely say that whatever the reason or reasons, and I suspect more than one, the important point in this thread is that with game and character creation it is not so vital a matter as to why so many RPGs tend to so often lack real substance regarding background, as it simply is that they do.)
Therefore to correct this dearth of developmental potential, this lack of character legacy and substantiality, I suggest including three (you may suggest more, I am suggesting three) new facets of character and game background and development. These three facets of background being the Heirloom, the Legacy, and the Inheritance.
Part Two: At this point I think it would be entirely constructive to define the terms being employed and then to show how those terms could be (re)defined and employed in game terms.
1. Heirloom – An heirloom is any property that is considered by law or custom as inseparable from an inheritance and is inherited with that inheritance. It can also be defined as anything that has been within the possession of a family for generations, and as anything that is possessed by a family and that contains great sentimental, historical, and/or physical and monetary value.
2. Legacy – A gift of personal property by will. It is also generally understood by at least implication to be any aspect of inherited duty, responsibility, or occupation, and these more nebulous and immaterial aspects can also include conditional and often overlooked features of a family’s history, such as when it is said that a group of people have a "family legacy.” This implies that a family, or even an organization or group of people such as a Guild, has a particular interest or set of interests upon which they have devoted much time, resource, and energy. Such as the fact that some families have a legacy of charity work, science, religious devotion or calling, or industry.
3. Inheritance – An inheritance can include many things. Such as; Hereditary succession to a title or an office or property, or That which is inherited; a title or property or estate that passes by law to the heir on the death of the owner, or (genetics) attributes acquired via biological heredity from the parents, or simply, any attribute or immaterial possession that is inherited from ancestors. An inheritance can include anything from a famous family sword that has been passed from father to son, to inherited lands and estates, to money, to even something as seemingly immaterially unimportant, but psychologically valuable and vital, as a family blessing.
I have used fairly simple and straightforward definitions in describing these terms, but definitions that are complex enough to imply some of the rich possibilities inherent within the terms. For each term is similar in some respects to the other, and as to what is implied thereby, but different enough in individual character, definition, and potential to be of enormous value in developing new gaming ideas and prospects.
As for me personally I have been passed and obtained numerous family heirlooms, part of my family’s legacy (especially as regards science and technical and technological matters, not to mention matters like law enforcement and military history, – although I have rejected other parts of my family legacy, such as certain kinds of employment – I have often followed a very different employment and career track than most of my family), and inheritances, such as the family estate which I partially inherited and partially bought and renovated. I also expect to inherit more at some time in the future. In other words I am a living example of how these important matters manifest themselves in human life, and I suspect many of you, if not most of you, have been the beneficiaries of, in one way or another, family heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances of your own.
Heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can be employed with great value as both a method of overall game and campaign development, and as the method for the production of individual adventures and quests. In the case of game and campaign development heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide thematic background material for players and important NPCs alike. In the case then of developing individual adventure material heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide valuable story plotlines and story progression points so that the DM or GM can personalize the experience of individual characters for the benefit of both the player and the overall setting or milieu.
Now, on to the matter as to how these things could express themselves in game terms. There are many defintional ways in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can overlap or become expressions of one another. So for purposes of this essay I will ignore those occasions and definitions in which these three aspects of historical background can impede upon each other, or indeed, even become for all practical purposes mere variant expressions of the other terms. Instead for purposes of game and character development I shall concentrate upon the divisions and differences of these various terms in order to stress how each term is and can be unique in function and construction. In other words, I’m not going to discuss how an heirloom can be simply a form of material inheritance, but rather how an heirloom can be expressed differently in game terms from an inheritance. I have already defined these terms above (for purposes of this essay) and so won’t bother to redefine them again. Instead I will describe some, but not all, of the ways in which heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can be used in-game to develop, organize, and enrich those same games, settings, backgrounds, and milieus.
Heirlooms – Heirlooms can be used in-game as both social and personal value material objects, providing there is some deep and intimate connection between those generations or groups of people who possess them. Heirlooms can be either secret or obvious magical (or even technological) objects; they can contain within them other secret or hidden objects (such as keys or jewelry, or messages or gemstones), etc. Heirlooms can contain codes or even be codes in and of themselves. They can be inscribed with glyphs, magical scripts, or even with phrases from dead languages, or mathematical symbols and mysterious signs. Heirlooms can point the way to an undiscovered or long hidden set of ruins. Heirlooms can be long extinct tools or devices whose purpose has been lost over time but could possibly be resurrected or revised. Heirlooms can contain old family secrets or relay information about a covert multi-generational family occupation, avocation, or concern. Heirlooms can be disputed, either by members of the same family or group, or by outsiders who likewise lay claim to the object. Heirlooms can be full of secrets and otherwise unrecorded history. They can be relical or miraculous in nature. And, of course, they will be practically a’swim in great sentimental and kinship value. Heirlooms can and should be used as the background for stories, undiscovered history, and the future development of the characters of the various players.
Legacies – Legacies can display themselves in the forms of titles, occupations, historical events, mysteries, and Quests (formal or informal - of clan, group, nation, culture, or person). Indeed a Quest, especially a multi-generational one can often be a kind of legacy in itself. Legacies can sometimes involve events as large as the turning of the Worm or the passing of an Age, involving whole societies or cultures (Alexander Hellenizing Egypt, the Near East, and eventually that legacy being passed down to most of Europe in one way or another), or legacies can involve individual or family responsibilities and duties, personal governance, or private patronage and economy. A reputation can be inherited as a legacy, as well as can be a real object. A reputation of leadership and honor to be lived up to and mastered, or a legacy of cowardice and dishonor to be overcome and put down. Legacies offer a varied and robust type of inheritance, even if legacies are often subtle, deceptive, and cunning in all that they imply. A good legacy is a thing of great value, a poor or malignant legacy is a thing of great concern, and yet either is superior to no legacy at all. Especially within the confines of a fantasy world. Yet one should also remember this, the very act of living and acting allows one to further build upon the legacies of the past, or to reshape them, or even to create new ones when and where desired or necessary.
Inheritances – In describing inheritances I shall concentrate primarily upon material inheritances other than heirlooms. I have also already described legacies as a form of family, societal, cultural or non-material inheritance. So instead of revisiting those terms I’ll describe inheritances in primarily physical, material, monetary, and technical terms.
Inheritances are matters of real wealth, physical objects (other than heirlooms), real estate or estates, money, and treasures of all sorts. A friend, ally, or inferior may have given an object to an ancestor that became an heirloom, to be passed with honor between generations. But those same people, and others as well, may have given not objects of necessarily sentimental or personal value, but objects of material, monetary, or more mundane wealth. They may have given gemstones, gold, silver or other precious metals, well-wrought jewelry, money, rare objects, artwork, lands, estates, houses and homes, keeps, castles or fortifications, and various other possessions which are then passed on to the character in the form of an inheritance. Then again ancestors may have accumulated their treasure through their own desires, efforts, labor, luck, and work. In any case an inheritance is a form of great blessing for it provides material surety against some forms of misfortune (such as chronic poverty) and it allows the character the necessary economic power and prosperity to pursue various personal aims and interests. Furthermore an inheritance may be in nature immediate, or it may be delayed, it may be granted and willed by an ancestor or friend, or it may have to be earned through hard labor or dangerous enterprise. Inheritances can be, and often are, contested. Inheritances offer a wealth (pun certainly intended) of new possibilities for role-play, unusual adventure, hostility, and complex character development.
How to Use and Employ Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances – Heirlooms, Legacies, and Inheritances do not have to be used crudely, or even immediately in order to benefit setting, campaign, adventure, and character development. They can be employed at any time. For instance upon returning home from an expedition or adventure a character might discover that his great uncle has unexpectedly left him a mysterious and unexplained heirloom. It is up to the character to discover the nature and purpose of the heirloom. Another character might inherit a number of heirlooms and family artifacts after his father’s death. A third character might discover that his family has a secret legacy involving the Grail, or was part of a movement or organization that he was previously completely unaware of. A fourth character might inherit an old mansion and estate, long abandoned, that he goes to occupy only to discover it has several secret passages and was the site of mysterious rites and bizarre conclaves.
The point is that there are many ways to make use of heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances, at least as many in-game as there are in real life. One need only employ a little imagination, or tap the fertile storehouses of legends, myths, fairy and folk tales, fiction, religion, or history.
And one does not need to employ heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances in all of the immediately obvious ways. A character might inherit an heirloom that sits idle and in hibernation for an entire campaign or more before something triggers it into action. A character might discover only bits and pieces of his family’s legacy over a great period of time, slowly piecing together the mystery of what it all means only with great effort and expense. A character might discoverer that his inheritance is one that must be earned through several dangerous adventures and labors, not merely granted by statement or will. He may also discover that what he expected to inherit is in fact quite different from what he actually inherits.
In any case heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances can provide an ongoing source of role-play adventure, action, mystery, conflict, and intrigue. And perhaps most importantly they can be individually tailored to particular characters, lending an air of realism and real connection between game world, setting, milieu, and campaign, and the involved players and their various characters. In a role playing sense it is almost entirely advantageous to integrate heirlooms, legacies, and inheritances into any role play game, setting, or background, and a loss of real potential to fail to do so.
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