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<blockquote data-quote="Kinematics" data-source="post: 8064898" data-attributes="member: 6932123">I didn't say that farmer is a culture. Rather, a farmer (or rancher, or similar) is someone representative of agrarian culture to a relatively broad degree, and sufficiently representative (compared to a non-agrarian culture) that getting a +1 Str from it would be entirely believable simply because of what growing up in that culture means.You skipped some of my write-up, it seems.&nbsp; 'American' is a culture recognized in real life, even though if you ask for details, no one can really describe what it is. But there are some vaguely agreed-upon elements that you could derive from it, as a standard stereotype level.&nbsp; Same if you took any subgroup, such as the stereotype of rednecks, or African-Americans.However, if I may re-quote myself:And further:Even if D&amp;D were set in modern day, &quot;American Culture&quot; would not be a useful mechanical descriptor.&nbsp; The term 'Culture' is used as a label for a mechanical element of the game which has a rough correspondence with what we might in casual conversation term 'culture', but is not the same thing.&nbsp; It's a label for a set of boosts (stats, skills, languages, whatever is decided upon) which are common to people who are members of a named group which can be agreed upon as being fairly narrow in scope, but broad enough to be easily understood by anyone referencing the rules.&nbsp; It also is a wrapper for social conventions common to that group.It is not narrow enough to be a single person's occupation or choice of vocation.&nbsp; A culture must be broad enough that you can say that your character has a decently large number of things in common with other people of the same culture.&nbsp; A desk clerk who works in a farming town, but was raised in the city, and doesn't really gel with the other locals, isn't part of an agrarian Culture.&nbsp; He may be a member of an agrarian society (and may equally describe himself as an &quot;American&quot;, in your examples), but that is very much not the same thing. Not everyone within the same community shares the same Culture.&nbsp; That is by intent.Culture, as described by my writeup, is not the same as &quot;Chinese immigrant culture&quot; or &quot;African-American culture&quot; or whatever, because those appellations are vastly broader in scope (while also being extremely specific to the setting) than what can be contained within a mechanical write-up.&nbsp; Each Culture must be narrow enough that you can easily extract the intent of it, but broad enough that it can easily be applied to a number of places within your world setting.</blockquote>

[QUOTE="Kinematics, post: 8064898, member: 6932123"] I didn't say that farmer is a culture. Rather, a farmer (or rancher, or similar) is someone representative of agrarian culture to a relatively broad degree, and sufficiently representative (compared to a non-agrarian culture) that getting a +1 Str from it would be entirely believable simply because of what growing up in that culture means. You skipped some of my write-up, it seems. 'American' is a culture recognized in real life, even though if you ask for details, no one can really describe what it is. But there are some vaguely agreed-upon elements that you could derive from it, as a standard stereotype level. Same if you took any subgroup, such as the stereotype of rednecks, or African-Americans. However, if I may re-quote myself: And further: Even if D&D were set in modern day, "American Culture" would not be a useful mechanical descriptor. The term 'Culture' is used as a label for a mechanical element of the game which has a rough correspondence with what we might in casual conversation term 'culture', but is not the same thing. It's a label for a set of boosts (stats, skills, languages, whatever is decided upon) which are common to people who are members of a named group which can be agreed upon as being fairly narrow in scope, but broad enough to be easily understood by anyone referencing the rules. It also is a wrapper for social conventions common to that group. It is not narrow enough to be a single person's occupation or choice of vocation. A culture must be broad enough that you can say that your character has a decently large number of things in common with other people of the same culture. A desk clerk who works in a farming town, but was raised in the city, and doesn't really gel with the other locals, isn't part of an agrarian Culture. He may be a member of an agrarian [i]society[/i] (and may equally describe himself as an "American", in your examples), but that is very much not the same thing. Not everyone within the same community shares the same Culture. That is by intent. Culture, as described by my writeup, is not the same as "Chinese immigrant culture" or "African-American culture" or whatever, because those appellations are vastly broader in scope (while also being extremely specific to the setting) than what can be contained within a mechanical write-up. Each Culture must be narrow enough that you can easily extract the intent of it, but broad enough that it can easily be applied to a number of places within your world setting. [/QUOTE]

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