Fantasy Communities - Melting pots or racially pure (ish)?

[Fenes]

What do you mean, "just"?

That lack of distance radically changes the dynamics of such a setting. Interaction between the different quarters is constant and unavoidable. Isolation is not possible. And any crisis that affects one part of the population can immediately spread to others. Anyone who wants to keep on top of it all - stay informed, and control the unfolding events - needs to react constantly to the latest developments, instead of just waiting a few days (or weeks) until he hears the latest news from the frontier.

A large, mixed community is essentially a whole setting in its own right - put into a pressure cooker and brought to boil.

Add teleport, teleport circles and portals, flying mounts, lighting railways etc., and you can be faster in the elven forest than you can walk through the bazaar of your capital on foot.

It's not the distance, it's the travel time that's an issue. If the city is big enough, and lacks magic transportation, then you've got the same issues. Likewise, just because there's an enclave close by doesn't mean there has to be interaction - even these days we've got people living for decades in a city without ever learning the language.

 

[Fenes]

So, it just seems to be that you're using a different definition for melting pot then Jürgen?

Basically, there are 3 concepts:
1) Isolated Communities with only one race and few or no outsiders.
2) Community consisting of several races, but each keep mostly to each other, possibilities for tension.
3) Fully integrated community of several races, no "ghettos" or tension

I think melting pot allows 2 and 3 in most definitions. The USA and especially big cities (say, New York) in the US are often considered "melting pots", despite the fact that there are also a lot of ghettos or even ethnic tension. Version 3 is certainly the ideal we hope to achieve.

Yes. I simply don't see a fundamental difference between 1 and 2, given magical travel, trade relations, and the usual cultural exchange that happnes on borders.

Fantasy Races are humans with funny ears _and_ a specific culture. If you remove the "ethnic" differences between them, all that remains are the ears, of course. But on another level, you also tell us something about the state of the country/city/region - these races lived so long together that their cultural differences became irrelevant.

The 4E implied PoL setting seems to support this idea to some extent - Dragonborn and Tiefling seem to be common and accepted enough to live and travel to cities and villages.

Which is exactly what I hate at the implied setting. Too much utopia for my taste.

How could this be? My guess is that the past Empire already united all these races, and they worked together for some time, long enough for peaceful relations.

I do not think this would work unless the different cultures were replaced by a common culture of the empire. And that in turn would reduce the races to humans with funny ears. But as long as you have different cultures there'll always be the (rather significant) potential for distrust and violence - especially if things go bad for the Empire.

But of course, that's not the only approach to PoLs (in the end, the reason why 4E uses these assumptions is because they work best for the game - the players can really see each "Point of Light" as a save haven, regardless of race or culture. If you wanted, each isolated Point of Light could also be "single-race", extremely skeptical to any traveller, especially one with horns, scales or pointy ears - unless all members of that community do have horns, scales or pointy ears, in which case, it looks the other way around.)

On a more general level, I think each appraoch has its merits, and there is also a good reason to use both.

You could have a "free and open" country where communities mix a lot of races. That might be appropriate for a recently colonized region, or just a country that came from uniting several races.
You can have an isolated country where only one race is common place.
You could have a country that was forcefully united, and now races that don't necessarily like each other have to work with each other in cities.
You could have a city that became a safe haven for all kinds of races after their homes had been threatened or destroyed, but the original inhabitants don't really know what to do with all these immigrants, and the immigrants prefer to stay among themselves, too.

I prefer to not have as PoL setting at all, but instead a rougher setting where the settlements are no safe havens but full of dangers too, from intrigue to criminals, coup d'etats, corrupt oppressive regimes and feudal clashes.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

Add teleport, teleport circles and portals, flying mounts, lighting railways etc., and you can be faster in the elven forest than you can walk through the bazaar of your capital on foot.

Presumably that "you" stands for "high-powered adventurer", since these modes of transportations are unlikely to be cheaply available in most fantasy settings. And fast modes of transportation available for an elite few don't change as much as close physical proximity for everyone.

If they are cheaply available, then the setting may indeed slowly begin to resemble a vast city. But I'd say that's the exception rather than the norm.

It's not the distance, it's the travel time that's an issue. If the city is big enough, and lacks magic transportation, then you've got the same issues. Likewise, just because there's an enclave close by doesn't mean there has to be interaction - even these days we've got people living for decades in a city without ever learning the language.

Sure, some people will be able to isolate themselves even in the same city. But they can't do that by themselves - they need the assistance of other people from the same ethnic/racial community who do interact with the rest of the city. And this results in a constant exchange of memes and interaction of clashing cultures which can be slowed down, but not prevented - increasing the social tensions within these communities. With separate kingdoms, isolation is much more feasible, especially since most citizens can't just take a walk to see how "the other half" lives, but are reliant on rumors and hearsay by travelers

 

[Fenes]

Sure, some people will be able to isolate themselves even in the same city. But they can't do that by themselves - they need the assistance of other people from the same ethnic/racial community who do interact with the rest of the city. And this results in a constant exchange of memes and interaction of clashing cultures which can be slowed down, but not prevented - increasing the social tensions within these communities. With separate kingdoms, isolation is much more feasible, especially since most citizens can't just take a walk to see how "the other half" lives, but are reliant on rumors and hearsay by travelers

Given how blind most people can be with regards to how "the others" live in the same town, and how conservative some cultures can be - check how many immigrants still live like they were in their home countries, then consider how much worse it'll be with elven and dwraven life spans - I'd not be so sure that just being in the same city means they exchange a lot more ideas than between countries who trade.

But I think we mainly differ in details, I might see countries less isolated than you do, you may see city enclaves less isolated than I see.

 

[Wyrmshadows]

Its not only a question of racial mixing, its a whole dynamic of believability

I don't want to DM or play in a setting that is basically a fantasy version of the Star Trek Federation. Dull as dirt IMO. I do not like "shiny happy campaigns" where the only people who have societies with...

Unequal distribution of wealth
sexism
racism
xenophobia
classism
illiteracy
ignorance
ie. believable social issues.

...are the "bad" societies.

Cosmopolitan regions should exist, but these are the exception to the rule. If all peoples are blended and everyone gets along, then no matter where you go you are essentially in the same place. Unless you are in an evil society there is absolutely no believable human drama in settings like this. Personally I loathe racism, classism and sexism in real life, but when I read a good book I expect people to behave believably and I expect the same thing from well-made role playing settings.

Using's D&D's traditional simplistic balck and white moral barometer, I don't know of one real-world society that would be good aligned. The best of them would be lawful-neutral and many, perhaps most of the greatest cultures in history would have been lawful evil. Rome, Persia, Egypt, Babylon, The European Holy Roman Empire, etc. all of these societies had such egregious social, military, legal, etc. practices that they would be evil by any traditional D&D standard.

Give me believable over sterilized any day. Believable is dramatic, sterile is boring. Watch the HBO series Rome and tell me how dull it would have been if they sanitized it. It would be ruined.


Wyrmshadows

 

[Mallus]

Generally speaking, do you prefer your in-game communities to be melting pots, with most, if not all, D&D races having representation, or do you prefer your dwarves one place, elves somewhere else, with only merchants, diplomats, and adventurers passing from one to another?

All my settings feature large, metropolitan areas full of all manner of "people" that are usually at each others throats, either metaphorically or with bloody literalism.

 

[Jürgen Hubert]

I think multi-racial communities are fairly easy to justify. After all, pretty much every major trade city throughout history had foreigners' enclaves.

In fact, justifying why those enclaves don't exist in a particular trade city may be harder. And, as I've said, the decreased story potential from such a situation might not make it worth it.