D&D in India ?

[shilsen]

Hrm..... that's something to think about. We're going to be there probably for a year or two and we're going to keep publishing. I wonder if there would be a viable market.


joe b.

I seriously doubt you'll find anything even close to a viable market now, because the concept of gaming (in the non-computer sense) has never been marketed there. There is a potential market, and a large one at that, but it would take some time and effort to be able to tap into it.

 

[ForceUser]

Hrm..... that's something to think about. We're going to be there probably for a year or two and we're going to keep publishing. I wonder if there would be a viable market.


joe b.

How about A Magical Medieval Society: India?

Oh, and Waylander, great link! Especially all the reader comments.

 

[John Q. Mayhem]

Just wanted to say that WotC has a web enhancement for OA called Mahasarpa that converts it to an India-flavoured setting.

 

[Nisarg]

Just wanted to say that WotC has a web enhancement for OA called Mahasarpa that converts it to an India-flavoured setting.

Yes, very very very badly.

I mean, its bad enough when they have Oriental Adventures, which butchers Japanese and Chinese culture, rams them together as only the culturally ignorant can, and releases that as its heavily stereotypical low-on-accuracy "oriental" setting.

But Mahasarpa is a sourcebook for Oriental Adventures, so they actually take the "japanese/chinese" classes from Oriental Adventures and try to jam those into Indian culture! It is the frankenstein monster of RPG settings; made from lots of disparate ill-fitting chunks and not very smart.

For a real India-setting in D&D, they would have to do a number of things. First of all, you would HAVE to have the caste system. Whether players got to chose which caste they were in, or the DM chose, or it was determined randomly, that's fine.. but you'd have to have it. You couldn't have a sudra being a cleric, and a Kshastriya rogue would be pretty ill-fitting. Barbarian would only be really suitable to foreigners from the mountains, you'd practically have to have an "aristocrat" class, etc. etc.

Next, you would have to have some kind of mechanic for Karma and the three Gunas. For the Gunas you could do something similar to the Law/balance/chaos mechanics they had in Stormbringer, replacing alignment, only it would tamas/rajas/sattvas. These would all three be variable stats, and tied to Karma somehow, so that if you acted in unrighteous ways or against your caste, you would accumulate penalties.

Then there would be the question of magic use... would the vedic temple priests get cleric spells? Krishna doesn't hold a high opinion of them in the Bhagavad Gita... maybe only Bhaktins should get cleric spells, as "miracles". So what would Yogis be? Psionicists?
Siddha Yogins/Tantrikas could be wizards.
But in any of these cases if it was REALLY going to fit the setting, the magic system would have to be highly altered. For the Bhaktins, for example, you would practically have to set up some kind of prayer mechanic, rather than just let them pick and choose spells.

What races would be available? Humans, obviously... maybe Rishis.. what about Avataras (then you'd be getting into an Exalted-style epic game, though)? Monkeys from Sri Lanka?
Nagas and Rakshasas would be important obviously, but probably not PC races...

There's a lot of stuff to consider.. maybe someday I'll take a crack at it...

Nisarg

 

[jgbrowning]

Joe,

I may have missed it but why exactly were you headed to India?

We visited for about 6 weeks in early 2002 and we liked it a lot. We got to thinking about our business and realized that we can do what we do anywhere in the world. So, we've purchased a new laptop (with a nice 17inch screen) and we'll buy another one before we leave.

We're still young (relatively, I'm almost 33, suzi's only 25) so there's no better time to start of our life of wandering. I wouldn't be surprised if we don't ever come "home" again. There's so much of the world we'd like to see. India's great in that it's very cheap, the people are very nice and I love the food... Other than that, were I to classify my religious belief I would fall somewhere around a hindu/budhist mish-mash so I feel very comfortable there.

How about A Magical Medieval Society: India?

Heh. We'll write something about India. I don't know if it'll be as detailed as MMS:WE, but it'll be something.

I seriously doubt you'll find anything even close to a viable market now, because the concept of gaming (in the non-computer sense) has never been marketed there. There is a potential market, and a large one at that, but it would take some time and effort to be able to tap into it.

We'd have at least a year, probably two to get some viral market creation going. Given the cost of living, advertising can't be to expensive, but the hardest part for us would be finding out where to go to target our right demographic (I'm assuming upper-middle and upper-class Indians), but since there are so many of them (what something like 250million?) finding out how to do that shouldn't be to hard. Were I to take a guess right now, I'd first head towards the universities.

joe b.

 

[Waylander the Slayer]

Indian mythos does have a variety of races. Rakshasas, for example, were not always necessarily evil - there are also "half rakshasas" (the son of Bheema-Gadolkaja, from the Mahabaratha for example). The other prevelant race would be the "monkey people." One might also consider a half devine template.

Cast will play a role in what type of access a person has to training but it is not restrictive as far as class (Ekalavya being an example, a good story for anyone to read:
http://www.geocities.com/neovedanta/mahabharata6.html ) .

There are those in indian mythology who have been prone to rage etc. As stated earlier, divine "miracles" happen through prayer- this is not limited to any caste as there have been many instances of miracles granted to both men and women - rather it is more about the amount of dedication and prayer to ones god. The role of cerimony and ritual would also play an integral part here.

Indian Culture (not found in the common mythos) has the prevelant idea of black/white magic.The source of the magic are usually other worldly sources (ghosts, spirits etc).Magic is prevelant in other forms, especially weapons and armor - these are usually of a divine nature.

As far as combat goes, the most common styles were sword/shield, Mace, Archery being the most valued. Chariots were also integral in this area. Anyhow thats my 10 rupees.

 

[Waylander the Slayer]

Off topic- but one of my fav characters from the Mahabharatha is Karna - read it here:
http://www.geocities.com/neovedanta/mahabharata7.html

Talk about tragic anti heros. If anyone has the chance to get their hands on DVDs of the Indian TV series on "The Mahabharata" you should do so. Even though it had over a 100 episodes, it was the best rendition of the epic and very fun; it has subtitiles too i believe.

It is the most watched TV series in Indian history;so there is some basis for a foundation there. The only other huge hiderance might be that Indian culture frowns on "free time" as such other than for watching movies and playing cricket or reading books.

 

[Krieg]

Yes, very very very badly.

I mean, its bad enough when they have Oriental Adventures, which butchers Japanese and Chinese culture, rams them together as only the culturally ignorant can, and releases that as its heavily stereotypical low-on-accuracy "oriental" setting.

As opposed to the highly accurate historical representation of western myths & culture presented in "stock" D&D?

 

[Lalato]

It's not perfect, but I really enjoyed the Mindshadows setting put out last year by Green Ronin. It is somewhat based on South Asian cultures. It has a well defined caste system. The only drawback I found was that it tried too hard to incorporate the "standard" D&D races... even though it does it in a very interesting way.

One thing my gaming group did, however, was combine the Mindshadows setting with Monte Cook's Arcana Unearthed. It worked very well... I really miss playing in that campaign.

Now back to the moving to India problem. I've never been, and the trip we were planning for next year has been changed (we're now going back to Thailand and adding Bali).

One group that might be interested in pen and paper RPG might be computer gamers. I'm sure there are people there that played games heavily influenced by D&D. Find those people and make them converts. It will be tough, but this is your mission, should you choose to accept it.

--sam

 

[dreaded_beast]

Yes, very very very badly.

I mean, its bad enough when they have Oriental Adventures, which butchers Japanese and Chinese culture, rams them together as only the culturally ignorant can, and releases that as its heavily stereotypical low-on-accuracy "oriental" setting.

I don't think it was the intention of the authors to try and produce a historically accurate "oriental" setting.

I believe they wanted to create a "stereotypical" oriental setting that drew on many different real life oriental cultures so that the gaming group could decide what elements they want to incorporate and what elements they wish to disregard.

Besides, in my opinion, DND is based on stereotypes, good and bad.