I interpreted the thread title to refer primarily to non-fantasy settings.
If you are one of the few who are doing that, playing a strictly historical game with no fantastic elements, my comments may not apply. I'm okay with that.
I interpreted the thread title to refer primarily to non-fantasy settings.
I have to agree with Umbran here, very few games are played that do not feature fantastical elements such as magic, super science, or something like that. There are a variety of Call of Cthulhu settings including the 1920s, 1890s, 2020s, Rome, the Middle Ages, etc., etc. but while they all have fantastical elements none of them are fantasy settings.I interpreted the thread title to refer primarily to non-fantasy settings.
Verisimilitude. Most of us don't think about disease so we don't miss it when it's not there. I could certainly have a not-Rome setting without slavery but I don't think I could set a Call of Cthulhu campaign in Rome circa 32 CE and just say there's no such things as slaves. It would take me right out of the setting. We might as well go play D&D at that point.And there's plenty of stuff in ancient worlds we don't bother putting in our games, but that shaped the histories in question - like disease! Smallpox caused such devastation in Imperial Rome that they had to change the laws to adjust for population loss.
Simply put: players decide to actually role play. Either by using reference to mechanics (as in Pendragon with it's trait and passion system), or by doing a bit of study (as in historical Japan as a setting, or Europe in Ars Magica).But how does a group really do this? How do you really drop modern sensibilities, and know you're doing it "authentically"? How does that play out at a table?
It's easy enough to say "Yeah, slavery exists" or "Yeah, people are racist", but then just sort of gloss over it except in special circumstances like when the barkeep says "We don't serve their kind here" or whatever. How does that get truly integrated into PCs' worldviews so it's a part of the game? I mean, beyond the handwavy stuff we already tend to do in a fantasy game?
And if a table is not really doing it "authentically", then what exactly are they doing, and why?
edit for grammar.
There's a respectable position in the history of ideas that regards that debate - instigated by the Franciscans - as the origin of modern legal notions of rights.Years ago when watching the movie adaptation of Uberto Ecco's In the Name of the Rose, there's a scene where some monks were debating over whether or not Jesus Christ owned his own robes. To modern ears, even among religious people, this sounds ridiculous.
In most historical periods, the denizens beliefs included the real presence of the supernatural. Not having it present in setting can be just as wrong as adding it.If you are one of the few who are doing that, playing a strictly historical game with no fantastic elements, my comments may not apply. I'm okay with that.
Verisimilitude. Most of us don't think about disease so we don't miss it when it's not there. I could certainly have a not-Rome setting without slavery but I don't think I could set a Call of Cthulhu campaign in Rome circa 32 CE and just say there's no such things as slaves. It would take me right out of the setting. We might as well go play D&D at that point.
On the subject of disease, there are definitely time periods and settings that, if I were basing a campaign in them, I'd be including notable disease events. I'm not entirely sure I'd trot out the 1e DMG's disease/parasitic infection checks... but you never know.Verisimilitude. Most of us don't think about disease so we don't miss it when it's not there. I could certainly have a not-Rome setting without slavery but I don't think I could set a Call of Cthulhu campaign in Rome circa 32 CE and just say there's no such things as slaves. It would take me right out of the setting. We might as well go play D&D at that point.
In most historical periods, the denizens beliefs included the real presence of the supernatural. Not having it present in setting can be just as wrong as adding it.
I saw an interview with Larry Hama, who is best known as the primary writer on Marvel's GI Joe line of comics in the 1980s and created the biographical sketches for characters that found their ways into the file cards on the backs of the action figures sold by Hasbro, where he referred to the cartoon series as "morally bankrupt." His problem was that the cartoon series depicted violence where nobody really got hurt. Pilots ejected just before enemy missiles hit their aircraft, instead of firing bullets all firearms shot laser beams, and ultimately nobody really got hurt. Contrast that with the comic book where people died and sometimes important people died. I still remember the death of Kwinn the Eskimo and the funeral Snake Eyes' funeral for his friend in a subsequent issue.So the argument, "It would ruin verisimilitude to leave out X" just means "I really want X".
Yes done. You transformed a historic setting into a fantasy one by completely changing the social order, the politics of that time and removed notable characters like Spartacus.You totally can. All those slaves are now... low-wage menial workers. Barely earning enough to get by, they cannot put together a stake large enough to change their lot in life. Poof, you're done.