Do your characters swear?

[joshwitz]

As the DM, I frequently have NPCs swear if it's appropriate. Sailors, Soliders, Theives swear alot; Nobles don't. While I sometimes use modern English swear words, I was inspired by a thread on the Scarred Lands message boards a while back to make up a list of Scarred Lands curses. (That's the setting we use).

The first few times I started using them, I got some strange looks and laughs, but when I noticed that one or 2 of the players started using Scarred Lands curses in game, I felt like it really added something.

Here's a short list (from memory):

"Titan's Blood!"
"Kadum's Blood!"
"Kadum's Wounds!"
"Mormo's Tit!" (also "Mormo's Left Tit!" or "By Mormo's Icy/Scaly Tit!") (Belsameth also works)
"Gods damn it!"
"Tanil's Bow/Arrow!"
"Chardun's Hells!" (or "By the 9 Hells of Chardun!")
"Goran's Axe!" (also Vangal)
"Madriel's Light!"
"Madriel's Mercy!"
...
etc.

 

[StalkingBlue]

I've seen little swearing of characters in games, and prob close to zero obcene swearing - which I think is a good thing overall. I do like inventive swearing that gives colour to a character, not a doubt about it, OTOH the more common, 20th-21st century US-flavoured swearing doesn't really float my boat. Definitely not in a fantasy roleplaying game.

That said, as others have mentioned, combining reference to entities deserving respect with reference to body parts is a nice template for swearing - lots of flavour and lots of control over just how mature you wanna get in a given situation or group.

My own characters have been pretty low-profile on the swearing so far.

My Northern, roughly Viking-type Barbarian/Knight warrior in a Dark Eye game in Hamburg would exclaim "Verfluchte Seeschlange!" (Accursed Sea Serpent!), more or less in the types of situtions in which a Vulcan might cooly remark, "Fascinating".

My German co-players evidently considered even that to be rather 'starker Tobak' ('strong tobacco' or what you Brits might refer to as 'quite extraordinary').

 

[Kemrain]

In a Thief game I threw "Taffer" around, but it didn't catch on..

In my current game, 50% of the characters, and a good many NPC's cuss regularly. Mine, only when upset, but I've met NPC's who couldn't go two words without fouling the air.

Cussing in DnD games makes sense to me, but I play in games that tend to look at the world as living and breathing. While a Paladin or a Cleric might not swear, sailors and generally lower classed people (nearly everyone else) do all the time, especially since most religions in our world don't forbid it. Like in life, it's just a part of the world, and nothing to get upset about. (And the Paladins of the God of Justice cuss enough to make up for all the educated people, just so ya know.)

If there was no cursing in my games, they'd feel awfully artificial.

- Kemrain the Taffer.

 

[Arnwyn]

Yes, but very rarely, and only in that "phoney-swearing" way that others have mentioned.

21st Century swearing, though, is heard whenever bad things happen...

 

[Nuclear Platypus]

My priest swears but usually when he gets superfrustrated or otherwise PO'd. So far its just Farscape's 'frell'. Often its the usual '<insert diety's name><insert body part>' expletives but some players get a bit creative with their metaphors.

 

[Ao the Overkitty]

The first reaction I got out of our DM when he read my character's journal. "Seth has quite the potty-mouth." Needless to say, I've had to clean it up a bit before it was posted.

Yes, my Paladin swears. A lot. Even in front of ladies. Of course, those ladies are his cousins.

I usually swear when we realize something that the DM has cooked up and it's about to bite us in the bum. I used to use frell a lot. And bloody hell.

I've been trying to clean up my language over the past 2 years and have met limited success.

 

[randomling]

I'm not very good at imaginative curses/oaths, but I'm trying for my Midnight PC.

In the Planescape game we have a real rat-bastard DM and I find myself swearing a lot, usually only semi-in-character. Our DM tapes the games to write them up as storyhours, and my PC is a worshipper of the goddess Tomeri - so whenever he comes across me swearing on the tape, he rewrites it as "Sweet Tomeri!"

 

[shadow]

No! No swearing for my characters. I have a time maintaining a medieval verisimilitude when charaters are using 20th century American swear words. Sure, there is evidence that "f-word" goes back some time (as do other swear words). However, most harsh language seems just to "modern" for my tastes. (Although, I might create some fantasy terms for my homebrew.)

Of course, in one group I played in, no swearing was allowed at all. The DM had a five year old son, and didn't want him picking up any naughty language from us fellow gamers

 

[shadow]

No! No swearing for my characters. I have a time maintaining a medieval verisimilitude when charaters are using 20th century American swear words. Sure, there is evidence that "f-word" goes back some time in one form or another (as do other swear words). However, most harsh language seems just to "modern" for my tastes. (Although, I might create some fantasy terms for my homebrew.)

Of course, in one group I played in, no swearing was allowed at all. The DM had a five year old son, and didn't want him picking up any naughty language from us fellow gamers

 

[S'mon]

OOC I tend to prefer no OOC obscene swearing during the game by me or anyone else, which tends to carry over to IC, though if I was GMing a foul-mouthed NPC I'd do the necessary.

I prefer to reserve my swearing for away-from-the-game, maybe down at the pub, or of course in those daily situations where it's a useful stress reliever.

It depends on the game of course - playing a GI soldier in Vietnam 1968 I'm much more likely to swear than when playing a high-fantasy heroine in a Tolkienesque fantasy world.