D&D General d&d is anti-medieval

[Helldritch]

If you take into account the faerie tales, the legends and the general look on the societies that D&D describe, it looks a lot like a fantastic medieval setting. It's not a simulation of the known historical medieval period. It's not even close. Magic, elves, orcs and all the rest of what we love in D&D never existed.

But just like in medieval times, your PCs work for the king, help princess (and princes) in distress. They go in escort missions for caravans, merchants, guilds and even pilgrims. Yes knights were doing that. We have the famous knight in shining armor but they're not from a long time ago, they are right there! So yep, D&D is medieval enough for me. But it's not a simulation of our historical medieval period.

 

[Horwath]

If you exclude magic and optional firearms rule, D&D is with aspect to technology level mostly late middle ages(14th/15th) century. Greatswords, pollaxes, and mostly widespread fullplate is 15th century.

we use currency becuase it's easier and needed for game simulation.

ffs, people argue that D&D math is hard. You know, adding and substracting 2 or 3 single digit numbers.

And now we should calculate plate armour price in 27 cows, 3 silver bars, an emerald, 7 days of plowing fields and 9 carats of ruby dust.

 

[Tonguez]

If you exclude magic and optional firearms rule, D&D is with aspect to technology level mostly late middle ages(14th/15th) century. Greatswords, pollaxes, and mostly widespread fullplate is 15th century.

we use currency becuase it's easier and needed for game simulation.

ffs, people argue that D&D math is hard. You know, adding and substracting 2 or 3 single digit numbers.

And now we should calculate plate armour price in 27 cows, 3 silver bars, an emerald, 7 days of plowing fields and 9 carats of ruby dust.

D20 Modern had a Wealth stat that nicely encapsulated PC ability to acquire stuff without the need for a cash based system, so it is quite possible to do without resorting to gold and silver coins. In my game I go even further and turn Wealth into Influence/Fealty ie the number of people that a PC can directly influence to do and get stuff. If the PCs want to consider those Fealty points to be serfs or family members is entirely up to them..

 

[TheCosmicKid]

But then... there is no such thing as a strict medieval model! It isn't like all nations and nation-states in the era we refer to as "medieval" had exactly the same governance structures, nor was any nation even static within one structure for the entire period!

It gets worse. Depending on which medievalist you ask, "feudalism" (as described in typical fashion by the linked blog post) may not have existed anywhere. And even among those who are willing to cop to, say, the Norman French running things in roughly this fashion for a few generations, it's seen as a kind of outdated and not particularly useful term/concept.

 

[Don Durito]

And now we should calculate plate armour price in 27 cows, 3 silver bars, an emerald, 7 days of plowing fields and 9 carats of ruby dust.

I think at the level the PCs are working at, it would probably be dealing with a series of different coinages of various dubious value which are themselves often devalued by people skimming off the edges for silver.

 

[Henry]

I think it started as intended as medieval fantasy, but along the way, the kitchen sinks tossed in by every player group turned it very early on into something all its own. Heck, even Gary was tossing in Shaolin monks, starships, and sixguns within three years of initial publication!

 

[Coroc]

d&d is anti-medieval

You can be forgiven for thinking that OD&D is a medieval European fantasy game. After all, Gary Gygax himself says so. He describes the original D&D books as “Rules for Fantastic Medi…

blogofholding.com

I've been on a dnd and classic history kick lately and ran into this blog entry.

The premise is that dungeons and dragons do not follow the medieval model.

I'm of the belief he's pretty much right (it draws as much on the classic western as any medieval trappings), but seeing if it is based on mostly the beginning, I'm asking if editions of dungeons and dragons are more or less similar and why?

DnD is in fact more Renaissance A.D. 1500+ than middle ages (800-1400 or so) concerning equipment in what is given in PHB and DMG. Of course gunpowder is purely optional, but you even got rules for that.

2e had some accessory for items and the historic campaign sourcebooks. They were a bit better to what was available. E.g. full plate started to become a thing at about 1375 or so and really saw widespread use 1420 to 1450, but at that time gunpowder weapons mostly in form of artillery started to get a big factor already.

Great swords also became a thing much later 1550 to 1650, they were a popular weapon in the thirty years war and used by special mercenaries. Although they also were the weapon of elite bodyguards sometimes, the Spanish montante has manuals teaching how to defend against multiple opponents.

These are only few of the examples where DnD hopelessly intermixes things, for the historic layperson the differences are unknown, so he will not realize anyway.

It is just common slang: Oh, knights with swords and castles, so it has to be middle ages. And btw, no one had a gun back then, these people were forced to use swords to cut through their armor to kill their foes.

 

[Sepulchrave II]

It gets worse. Depending on which medievalist you ask, "feudalism" (as described in typical fashion by the linked blog post) may not have existed anywhere. And even among those who are willing to cop to, say, the Norman French running things in roughly this fashion for a few generations, it's seen as a kind of outdated and not particularly useful term/concept.

I agree that, at best, feudalism can be seen as a function of certain medieval societies, rather than any kind of defining feature. It strikes me that we are considering three things:

1) The world of D&D

2) Our internal model of "Medieval" which has been filtered through art and literature for the past several centuries. It has been romanticized, historicized, scrutinized, demythologized, remythologized, Hollywoodized etc.

3) The real Middle Ages

It seems that we are looking at the difference between the first and second categories; the third category barely enters the equation.

 

[Coroc]

I agree that, at best, feudalism can be seen as a function of certain medieval societies, rather than any kind of defining feature. It strikes me that we are considering three things:

1) The world of D&D

2) Our internal model of "Medieval" which has been filtered through art and literature for the past several centuries. It has been romanticized, historicized, scrutinized, demythologized, remythologized, Hollywoodized etc.

3) The real Middle Ages

It seems that we are looking at the difference between the first and second categories; the third category barely enters the equation.

^^This puts it down perfectly on an abstract level

 

[Coroc]

Gygax and the TSR crew were big into Vance's The Dying Earth.

Which is End times in fact, and a great read.