Have you played D&D in a foreign language?

[Psionicist]

Min fighter når den nästa nivån. Han höjer sin Dex, så går hans Armour Class upp till tjugotre. För sin feat tar han improved init, för att han anfaller alltid sist med svärden.

It's even worse in "Swenglish":

Min fighter levlar upp. Han höjer sin Dex så Ah Se ökar till tjugotre. Som feat tar han improved initativ för han alltid anfaller sist med sitt svörd.

 

[Snoweel]

Ah yes, good ol' Stockholm Svengelska.

 

[Perun]

Hm... since everybody's joining the party, I don't want to be left out... However, please note that I don't speak French, Swedish, or Swenglish, so I'm only guessing what was it that you people said

Moj ratnik je prešao nivo. Podigao je Dex, pa mu je A-Ce sad dvadeset i tri. Za feat će uzeti Improved Initiative, jer u bitci napada mačem.

 

[Allanon]

"Mijn Fighter is net geleveled. Hij verhoogd zijn Dex, z'n AC wordt dan 23. Als Feat neemt hij Improved Initiative, omdat hij altijd als laatste aanvalt met zijn zwaard."

The above is a rough translation to dutch, but since it has been a while since I've used my french I'm not sure of it's totally accurate

.
Look how the dutch instictively use a word like level for which whe have a perfectly good alternative "niveau" and basterdize it to "geleveled"

 

[Perun]

I was interested to note that one of the words you list, coprnica/coprnjak, looks very similar to the name of the ancient astronomer, Copernicus. Was his name perhaps a Latinized translation of a Croation word for witch, or could the two have derived from a common stem?

No, no connection that I'm aware of. Apparently, coprnica is a regionalism, and comes from German. My guess is it's a corrupt form of Zauberin.

The following bit is for those who want to read some more of absolutely irrelevant and mostly useless info.

Also, Copernicus is pronounced with a 'k' sound (KOH-per-nee-kus), while 'coprnica' is pronounced more like TSO-per-nee-tsa. Croatian 'c' is never pronounced as the 'c' in 'cat'. It's more of a 'ts' sound.

Not that it's relevant...

 

[retan]

Min fighter når den nästa nivån. Han höjer sin Dex, så går hans Armour Class upp till tjugotre. För sin feat tar han improved init, för att han anfaller alltid sist med svärden.

The same as my players would say it:

Krigeren min går opp en level. Han går opp en i Dex, og derfor går hans AC opp til tjuetre. Han får også en ny feat og velger improved init, slik at han ikke alltid angriper sist med sverdet sitt.

"Kriger" is norwegian for Fighter and "sverd" is norwegian for sword.

-- retan

 

[Snoweel]

"Kriger" is norwegian for Fighter and "sverd" is norwegian for sword.

Yeah, we've got 'krigare', which means 'warrior' or 'fighter', but we'd use the English term in D&D. Sword is 'svärd' which is pronounced just like your 'sverd' only we don't sound so cheerful when we say it.

 

[Zappo]

All my own books are the English versions, and I never considered buying the italian ones for myself. However I did buy the italian PHB to a friend as a birthday present, and although I have only taken a quick look at it, my friend says that the book was extremely well written (at least he didn't expect it to be so well done, but he had not seen anything of 3rd edition before).

Strictly speaking of translation of terms, I have the italian/english D&D translation guide from an italian RPG website, and I have to say that I have mixed feelings about it. If I was playing in Italian, I would try to use the italian words as much as possible, but a few of them sound quite lame to be honest... what the heck is the idea behind translating carrion crawler to verme-iena (hyena-worm)? Also the spells still sound more cool in english to me.

What Fabio said. I game with lots of non- or very poor english speakers, so using an English PHB is out of the equation. The Italian translations are actually excellent, they have a high degree of consistancy both internal, across books, and even with the previous editions all the way back to OD&D. The terms have been chosen to reflect the original intention more than an actual translation - for example, "Strisciante delle Carogne", while technically correct, would be awful for a carrion crawler. Verme-iena is shorter, easier to pronounce, and perfectly conveys the meaning of something that crawls (worm) and eats carrion (hyena). This kind of stuff is the hallmark of a professional translation.

There are only two things in translated D&D that really irk me. One is that they translated "rogue" with the same term for "thief". I would be unable to find a better translation though. All possible translations for "rogue" are either synonymous with thief, or are unused/old-fashioned words, or have a strongly negative connotation.

The other is with the magic schools, where "conjuration" => "evocazione" and "evocation" => "invocazione". Or something like that, I can't bloody ever remember them. A typical session where I DM will feature scenes like: "ok, you see a magical aura of... uhm... evocazione... eer... well, the fireball school".

Some of the spells sound better in English, and there's no denying that, but they aren't many. Chiefly the fireball; the possibility to merge two words in English gives its best here and many friends of mine usually say fireball rather than "palla di fuoco". Actually, even the word "spell" sounds better than "incantesimo". I can't think of any other term right now for which we use the english version.

A different matter is stuff that comes from English manuals. We use it in English. This includes lots of Star Wars terms, for example, to the point that the (fully translated and dubbed) movies actually sound wrong to some of us.

 

[Zappo]

I forgot to mention another important thing... all the weights and lengths use the metric system in the Italian version. The system is pretty much designed around English units, though, so there are more decimal numbers involved than in the English version (especially with weights, where they assumed 1 pound = 0.45 kg... I would have used 1 pound = 0.5 kg, makes things heavier but also a lot simpler).
It does have the weird bonus that speeds are numerically the same as 2E speeds.

 

[Li Shenron]

There are only two things in translated D&D that really irk me. One is that they translated "rogue" with the same term for "thief". I would be unable to find a better translation though. All possible translations for "rogue" are either synonymous with thief, or are unused/old-fashioned words, or have a strongly negative connotation.

True, I also had the same thought long ago, but can't really think of anything better... Not sure, but "Ladro" was used in all previous editions, or also something else was tried? Like "Avventuriero" (bad, since every PC basically is), "Canaglia" (sounds too evil) or "Vagabondo" (sounds too poor)?

The other is with the magic schools, where "conjuration" => "evocazione" and "evocation" => "invocazione". Or something like that, I can't bloody ever remember them. A typical session where I DM will feature scenes like: "ok, you see a magical aura of... uhm... evocazione... eer... well, the fireball school".

I absolutely agree!

Also there is a lot of confusion between "abilita'" and "caratteristiche"

But some things are improved IMHO: for example to me "talenti" sounds better than "feats"...