do you thee and thou and whence?

[shadow]

I played a noble knight in a Birthright game some time ago. I would try to use archaic English when role-playing. However, none of the other players used it so I kind of stuck out as an oddball. After a while I decided to drop the whole thing since I was the only player doing it.

Still if I could get a group of players that were interested in Shakespearian and King James English together, that would be great!

 

[Voadam]

We generally use normal english without modern anachronisms.

I've used little effects to define a character's roleplay though.

I played a merchant prince wizard who only referred to other people by their last names (usually brusquely). It can be fun to be called milord or lord.

I played a viking background character where I was making up oaths based off of norse mythology "Tyr's severed Hand!" "Odin's missing eye!" "Angrboda's spiteful denial!"

It was a lot of fun.

 

[diaglo]

depends on the group.

i have thee'd and thou'd and anon'd.

but mostly i just like to keep my language understood.

if i started spouting off in other dialects and talking about my plates of meat i don't think some players would understand what i'm saying. i need the player to know what i mean even if his character would already.

 

[Henry]

Sounds normal to me. Forsooth, however, is right out.

Yea, verily.

I find that I use different turns of phrase for NPC's when I want them to stand out. Having a peasant in the Dalelands talk like Ross Perot (or as I've come to find out, "native Texan" ) really threw my players off, once.

I've even used the cleric from the Princess Bride in one session, mixed with Boomhauer from King of the Hill. You want to talk about the player lynching of a lifetime? One player, however, understood me, and actually got the info the party needed. He said the scariest part of the whole adventure was the fact that he understood me.

 

[Enkhidu]

A pet peeve (though very slight):

Using "thee"s and "thou"s is not Old English: this is Old English. It is not Middle Enlgish: this is Middle English. the "thee"s and "thou"s and "forsooth"s are Elizabethan English, circa 1550 to 1650.

And now back to your regularly scheduled thread.