Common
- Thread starter haakon1
- Start date
Jack Daniel
Legend
I would say, even if the elves (or dwarves or orcs) all share a common plane of origin and have simply migrated to Oerth and Abeir-Toril and Mystara, they've all likely been separated for sufficiently many centuries or millennia for significant linguistic drift to have rendered one Elvish mutually unintelligible from another. Further apart even than Sindarin and Quenya. But there could still be commonalities that make learning a different Elvish, or very simple communication, easier.
the Jester
Legend
It depends on how much you want to emphasize language and language barriers in your game.
aco175
Legend
How many people have characters bridge to other worlds? This has not happened in any game I played in for like 30+ years to the point that it is a non-starter. This also goes to @the Jester ('s) point of having languages be something in you games.
While it makes sense to have common drift into something not the same as another common from another land/world, most play with common being able to talk with others in the game. A point could be made for other races and their language being solid and maybe from their gods to not change, but then there are worlds with things like 'old elvish' or something.
While it makes sense to have common drift into something not the same as another common from another land/world, most play with common being able to talk with others in the game. A point could be made for other races and their language being solid and maybe from their gods to not change, but then there are worlds with things like 'old elvish' or something.
the Jester
Legend
I have to say, I see travel from world to world occasionally in my game, but far more common is traveling vast differences. And when you go far enough from home, Common is a different tongue. "Common" in the main play area is actually "Imperial", while if you far enough away, it might be "Peshan" or some other tongue.
I miss the days when everyone knew like 8-10 languages and Hill Giant was a distinct dialect from Stone Giant. But it definitely complicated things.
Blackrat
He Who Lurks Beyond The Veil
I go so far as to say that common is different even within regions of the same setting. Sword Coast Common is quite unlike Dales Common and even further from Eastern Sea of Fallen Stars Common. They do share a lot, but they are distinctive dialects. Speaking slow and emoting with your hands, you can communicate with eachother.
MNblockhead
A Title Much Cooler Than Anything on the Old Site
All are short hand for the lingua franca of various cultural groups. Some areas are remote enough that it is hard to find someone who speak any of the major languages, or have a strong sense of cultural chauvinism that they refuse to.
J.Quondam
CR 1/8
In practice, there's a setting-specific Common, Elvish, Dwarvish, etc; though I can't recall playing a game where settings (as used here) really overlapped much.
My preference is to do away with Common entirely, except maybe as a simple trade-pidgin; and all the other languages are really more like language families, with individual regional languages that are mutually intelligible, to a more or lesser extent; and each language is more or less suitable for specific types of communication (eg, a wizard might accomplish more with some form of Draconic or Celestial than with mortal Dwarvish or Orc). And there are ancient versions of languages, and unusual dialects, magical and ritual languages, harder and easier languages, codes and cants and jargons, and so on....
But that sort of depth has always just ended up being more of a headache at the table without a LOT of buy in from players... which inevitably peters out over a few sessions. So again, in practice, they're all just single, setting-specific languages in my games.
My preference is to do away with Common entirely, except maybe as a simple trade-pidgin; and all the other languages are really more like language families, with individual regional languages that are mutually intelligible, to a more or lesser extent; and each language is more or less suitable for specific types of communication (eg, a wizard might accomplish more with some form of Draconic or Celestial than with mortal Dwarvish or Orc). And there are ancient versions of languages, and unusual dialects, magical and ritual languages, harder and easier languages, codes and cants and jargons, and so on....
But that sort of depth has always just ended up being more of a headache at the table without a LOT of buy in from players... which inevitably peters out over a few sessions. So again, in practice, they're all just single, setting-specific languages in my games.
Voadam
Legend
It would depend on your cosmology and your desire for languages to be universal versus realistic with hundreds of individual ones.
Do different worlds have a common origin? Are they alternate prime material worlds, Amber style Shadow reflections, different dreams in the same Dreaming?
Are different worlds actually different planets with independent different origins?
Do you have mostly the core D&D languages in your world or do you have the diversity of languages that say Medieval Europe or Ancient Mediterranean would have had?
Do you want your spelljamming PCs to be able to travel widely and talk to everybody or travel widely and have to rely upon magic translation stuff?
For my games I generally go with the core D&D languages and make things like ancient elvish be a dialect of elvish that is understandable but noticeably different so it can be a flavor cue without requiring magic to understand. I mostly don't want to deal with languages a lot in my D&D, but having some options and flavor is fine.
A lot of D&D is both fairly restrictive on languages known and makes most everything speak common as well, so that most PCs speak one other language and monsters speaking in their own languages to each other can be unintelligible or not, but most everybody can speak at core. 3e had some options for learning one language per level in the skill system which meant a linguist PC was an option to build.
Do different worlds have a common origin? Are they alternate prime material worlds, Amber style Shadow reflections, different dreams in the same Dreaming?
Are different worlds actually different planets with independent different origins?
Do you have mostly the core D&D languages in your world or do you have the diversity of languages that say Medieval Europe or Ancient Mediterranean would have had?
Do you want your spelljamming PCs to be able to travel widely and talk to everybody or travel widely and have to rely upon magic translation stuff?
For my games I generally go with the core D&D languages and make things like ancient elvish be a dialect of elvish that is understandable but noticeably different so it can be a flavor cue without requiring magic to understand. I mostly don't want to deal with languages a lot in my D&D, but having some options and flavor is fine.
A lot of D&D is both fairly restrictive on languages known and makes most everything speak common as well, so that most PCs speak one other language and monsters speaking in their own languages to each other can be unintelligible or not, but most everybody can speak at core. 3e had some options for learning one language per level in the skill system which meant a linguist PC was an option to build.
Elvish is the same. It is a racial language devised by Labelas Enoreth and taught innately at birth. When the first elf will see a TV or a microprocessor, the appropriate elvish word will be revealed innately to him... and every other elf as the word will by written in the Elvish Language Thesaurus. You can read sagas from thousands of centuries ago easily because the elven language is timeless, unchanging and god-given, across planes.
Other languages are setting-dependent because they are devices invented by mortals to communicate.
At my table, we often play language barrier... there is Common but it's... quite uncommon, more like Latin in the middle ages. You'll find some people to communicate with in every village, but that's not the same as "everyone is speaking Common".
Other languages are setting-dependent because they are devices invented by mortals to communicate.
At my table, we often play language barrier... there is Common but it's... quite uncommon, more like Latin in the middle ages. You'll find some people to communicate with in every village, but that's not the same as "everyone is speaking Common".
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