D&D 5E How should be the future Oriental Adventures.

[LuisCarlos17f]

After thinking my opinion is we may see a future sourcebook "(Insert X-name here)'s guide of the far lands", practically PC races and monsters, almost all crunch.

We aren't going to see yet anything like a Kara-Tur gazetteer. It's not necessary in the internet age when you can "borrow" the maps and background from the fandom wikis of your favorite manga-anime.

The PC races need a right power balance, of course, but also an interesting concept to can create cool characters. If it's not easy to find inspiration to create a new story in a fictional work (not gameplay at all) using as main character a member of X-Race then isn't a good race. Each race has to be so cool mangaka wanted to used them in their own works.

* The power to speak with animals (by gnome and spirit-fol) could be very useful in the fiction, but not in most of hask-and-slash adventures. That racial traits by the spirit-folk/shen should can be replaced with a "racial feat".

Who wanted to play a character who is beautiful, lives happy in the nature and can speak with animals? Fans of Disney princess!!

I imagine korobokur with a kasa(hats) made with only a giant leaf, because it's their tradicional clothing. They are noble heart but with horrible social skills for the hight standard of civilitated and sophisticated people from the court or the capital city. And they would rather to live in their own commune because they are sick with the game of thrones and conspiracies in the throne (and worse when dragons and other supernatural factions are implicated in the secret fights for the power). Koroboku can be like the characters from comedy they are fun when they are too sincere

And tanuki with two bags in their inner thigh because in their culture is symbol of wealth and manhood.

The retcon for the kappa is the water in the concavity on their craniums isn't easy to be spilled because they are practically water elementals, as part of the own kappa body. it's is like a cooling system because they kappa uses their powers their brain overheated like a machine at full power.

The origin of the long of the tengu (symbol of pround and arrogance) is in the past they wore masks with long nose as sign of "don't occupy my personal space", something like the masks with beaks by the plague doctors. In the past they were members of a cult of a "dog demon" but they reject him, maybe even betray him.

* I can say that episode of the Simpsons set in Spain was ridiculous for me because the scripter said some thing aren't true, but I am not going to ask a boycott but I may explain because they are wrong and the real Spain is different.

 

[GreenTengu]

Something that I feel very odd in regards to Fantasy that takes place in Asian settings written by Westerners-- and this is more about Legends of Five Rings that Karatur which I don't have so much familiarity with, but my only brush with it suggests it also has this element-- is this....

When the writers go and explain the world-- sure, there may be "nobles" and "peasants" and "a king". But not much emphasis is put on any of that. You aren't asked to determine exactly what social class your character has. People are not likely to be harmed or killed for having bothered someone in a higher class. There isn't emphasis put on the peasants being legally tied to the land and them trying to leave would be grounds for execution. We rarely hear of exactly how the tax system works and what the tax burden would be... and certainly the "adventurers" are not expected to be explicitly state-sanctioned in doing their wok with certain responsibilities they need to fulfill, or at least it is generally quite voluntary on the players part if they want to be involved with that.

But then they go and the write a setting with Asian themes-- suddenly, even though roughly an identical feudal system with extremely similar rules existed in Europe, it is only then that the writers feel the need to explicitly impose the details of the feudal system onto the setting. Suddenly, because it is set in an Asian-based setting, social class is massively influenced and players need to be from a particular social class or be denied tons of rights. Their relation to the "imperial system" is heavily emphasized and the it is explicitly detailed what the player's privileges, state-sanctioned powers and personal responsibilities are.

And they are all often taken to a rigorous extent beyond what really existed in Asia outside of maybe the Tokugawa Shogunite of the 1700-1800s. And often things that are explicitly horrors of European feudal system are placed in there even if they were hardly a thing in Asia.

So I always thought it was odd that when dealing with the European-based setting, one just handwaves stuff and says people are basically free and not to sweat the exact mechanical details of how all the politics work. But when dealing with an Asian-based setting, suddenly they really want to impose on players the horrors of the feudal system in order to make the whole thing seem more alien and oppressive.

And then there are other silly details-- like this idea that samurai explicitly used swords and only swords, refusing to so much as entertain using any other weapon, and building the entire class around having a magic sword-- when in reality, samurai, much like knights, started off as armored mounted horsemen and their primary weapons were spears and bows. They even used guns. And only once the samurai era was dead and gone was a large emphasis put on the swords (mostly because a ton of samurai sold everything else off to feed their drinking, gambling and um... other recreational... habits) so that the sword was the last thing left. Other than that it was just a side-arm that maybe they would have in case they were attacked inside a castle or on the streets in a city, but were not their primary weapon of war.


I really think it does everyone a massive disfavor.

 

[Panda-s1]

Something that I feel very odd in regards to Fantasy that takes place in Asian settings written by Westerners-- and this is more about Legends of Five Rings that Karatur which I don't have so much familiarity with, but my only brush with it suggests it also has this element-- is this....

When the writers go and explain the world-- sure, there may be "nobles" and "peasants" and "a king". But not much emphasis is put on any of that. You aren't asked to determine exactly what social class your character has. People are not likely to be harmed or killed for having bothered someone in a higher class. There isn't emphasis put on the peasants being legally tied to the land and them trying to leave would be grounds for execution. We rarely hear of exactly how the tax system works and what the tax burden would be... and certainly the "adventurers" are not expected to be explicitly state-sanctioned in doing their wok with certain responsibilities they need to fulfill, or at least it is generally quite voluntary on the players part if they want to be involved with that.

But then they go and the write a setting with Asian themes-- suddenly, even though roughly an identical feudal system with extremely similar rules existed in Europe, it is only then that the writers feel the need to explicitly impose the details of the feudal system onto the setting. Suddenly, because it is set in an Asian-based setting, social class is massively influenced and players need to be from a particular social class or be denied tons of rights. Their relation to the "imperial system" is heavily emphasized and the it is explicitly detailed what the player's privileges, state-sanctioned powers and personal responsibilities are.

And they are all often taken to a rigorous extent beyond what really existed in Asia outside of maybe the Tokugawa Shogunite of the 1700-1800s. And often things that are explicitly horrors of European feudal system are placed in there even if they were hardly a thing in Asia.

So I always thought it was odd that when dealing with the European-based setting, one just handwaves stuff and says people are basically free and not to sweat the exact mechanical details of how all the politics work. But when dealing with an Asian-based setting, suddenly they really want to impose on players the horrors of the feudal system in order to make the whole thing seem more alien and oppressive.

yeah, no, imposing rigid social hierarchies on your setting "because Asia" would be an example of Orientalism. to be fair the shogunate did make a whole to-do about social classes in an effort to legitimize their rule, but you're right in calling out how imposing this on all Asian settings is weird.

And then there are other silly details-- like this idea that samurai explicitly used swords and only swords, refusing to so much as entertain using any other weapon, and building the entire class around having a magic sword-- when in reality, samurai, much like knights, started off as armored mounted horsemen and their primary weapons were spears and bows. They even used guns. And only once the samurai era was dead and gone was a large emphasis put on the swords (mostly because a ton of samurai sold everything else off to feed their drinking, gambling and um... other recreational... habits) so that the sword was the last thing left. Other than that it was just a side-arm that maybe they would have in case they were attacked inside a castle or on the streets in a city, but were not their primary weapon of war.


I really think it does everyone a massive disfavor.

yeah I'm also constantly disappointed in official samurai options. personally I think we should have two different samurai sub-classes, one for the Sengoku era armor clad samurai who mostly fought on horses (also not exactly exclusive to Japan, so labeling it as "samurai" is weird), and another for the Edo period samurai who wanders and uses his sword to help useless villagers. yeah that last one is tropey and not realistic, but it is fun and worth exploring imo.

also while we're on tropes: ninja. I brought this up in a different thread, but I'm disappointed how they're almost entirely based on the Western interpretation of ninja that was created like 30-40 years ago and hasn't aged at all. I'd totally play a character who's sneaky and uses cool magical abilities to fight enemies. it's not like the west is ignorant of these ninja tropes either, they make their way here via Japanese pop culture, but we don't even use the tropes made up by the country where ninja come from lmao.

 

[pemerton]

Something that I feel very odd in regards to Fantasy that takes place in Asian settings written by Westerners-- and this is more about Legends of Five Rings that Karatur which I don't have so much familiarity with, but my only brush with it suggests it also has this element-- is this....

<snip description of typical "European" setting>

-- suddenly, even though roughly an identical feudal system with extremely similar rules existed in Europe, it is only then that the writers feel the need to explicitly impose the details of the feudal system onto the setting. Suddenly, because it is set in an Asian-based setting, social class is massively influenced and players need to be from a particular social class or be denied tons of rights. Their relation to the "imperial system" is heavily emphasized and the it is explicitly detailed what the player's privileges, state-sanctioned powers and personal responsibilities are.

And they are all often taken to a rigorous extent beyond what really existed in Asia outside of maybe the Tokugawa Shogunite of the 1700-1800s. And often things that are explicitly horrors of European feudal system are placed in there even if they were hardly a thing in Asia.

This is one of the best posts I've seen in these OA thread. Thanks.

Here is something I posted in the other thread:

what makes OA the best RPG book in the AD&D line is that it is the only one that shows how RPGing can be about something other than dungeon-crawling or other forms of puzzle-solving: it encourages the creation of characters who have meaningful connections to the world they inhabit (they have families and masters and lords and the like) and it encourages the GM to frame encounters that are meaningful expressions of the world also, and that connect to those PCs (hierarchies of spirits, who have motivations other than eating dungeon explorers; rivals and challengers; etc).

Is it a sign of racism that AD&D books which take the outlook of European-descended Americans as the default present their protagonists as rootless, aimless and essentially nihilistic; while the one book that self-consciously tries to present historical Asian cultures presents its protagonists as rooted, connected, and motivated by other- as much or even more than self-regard? Perhaps

The OA rulebook is not consistent on the importance of social class - in places it emphasises it (eg for samurai; but not too much more than UA does for cavaliers) and at other places it is relaxed about it (eg in the bushi class description and class abiities; in the description of martial artists and martial arts masters.

My reading is that there is a drive towards "history" in some fashion that is not found in the "mainstream" D&D books because they rest more heavily on pulp and other ahistorical ficiton. That drive towards "history" has some essentialist elements, I think, but also a sense of trying to be accurate or faithful. The upshot is a D&D book that supports play that is recognisabily closer to (eg) Burning Wheel or Prince Valiant than (eg) Keep on the Borderlands or Castle Greyhawk.

 

[Mercurius]

My reading is that there is a drive towards "history" in some fashion that is not found in the "mainstream" D&D books because they rest more heavily on pulp and other ahistorical ficiton. That drive towards "history" has some essentialist elements, I think, but also a sense of trying to be accurate or faithful. The upshot is a D&D book that supports play that is recognisabily closer to (eg) Burning Wheel or Prince Valiant than (eg) Keep on the Borderlands or Castle Greyhawk.

This makes me wonder if a future OA book would be better served by being more heavily--and explicitly--based upon wuxia, anime, and other forms of Asian popular and "pulp" depictions. This would correlate it more strongly with their Western fantasy treatments, which are far from Harn-like.

 

[Chaosmancer]

Something that I feel very odd in regards to Fantasy that takes place in Asian settings written by Westerners-- and this is more about Legends of Five Rings that Karatur which I don't have so much familiarity with, but my only brush with it suggests it also has this element-- is this....

When the writers go and explain the world-- sure, there may be "nobles" and "peasants" and "a king". But not much emphasis is put on any of that. You aren't asked to determine exactly what social class your character has. People are not likely to be harmed or killed for having bothered someone in a higher class. There isn't emphasis put on the peasants being legally tied to the land and them trying to leave would be grounds for execution. We rarely hear of exactly how the tax system works and what the tax burden would be... and certainly the "adventurers" are not expected to be explicitly state-sanctioned in doing their wok with certain responsibilities they need to fulfill, or at least it is generally quite voluntary on the players part if they want to be involved with that.

But then they go and the write a setting with Asian themes-- suddenly, even though roughly an identical feudal system with extremely similar rules existed in Europe, it is only then that the writers feel the need to explicitly impose the details of the feudal system onto the setting. Suddenly, because it is set in an Asian-based setting, social class is massively influenced and players need to be from a particular social class or be denied tons of rights. Their relation to the "imperial system" is heavily emphasized and the it is explicitly detailed what the player's privileges, state-sanctioned powers and personal responsibilities are.

And they are all often taken to a rigorous extent beyond what really existed in Asia outside of maybe the Tokugawa Shogunite of the 1700-1800s. And often things that are explicitly horrors of European feudal system are placed in there even if they were hardly a thing in Asia.

So I always thought it was odd that when dealing with the European-based setting, one just handwaves stuff and says people are basically free and not to sweat the exact mechanical details of how all the politics work. But when dealing with an Asian-based setting, suddenly they really want to impose on players the horrors of the feudal system in order to make the whole thing seem more alien and oppressive.

And then there are other silly details-- like this idea that samurai explicitly used swords and only swords, refusing to so much as entertain using any other weapon, and building the entire class around having a magic sword-- when in reality, samurai, much like knights, started off as armored mounted horsemen and their primary weapons were spears and bows. They even used guns. And only once the samurai era was dead and gone was a large emphasis put on the swords (mostly because a ton of samurai sold everything else off to feed their drinking, gambling and um... other recreational... habits) so that the sword was the last thing left. Other than that it was just a side-arm that maybe they would have in case they were attacked inside a castle or on the streets in a city, but were not their primary weapon of war.


I really think it does everyone a massive disfavor.

Yes, all of this and like we were discussing earlier. Knights had codes of honor, nobility did, ect. Honor was a big thing in certain european cultures.

But, if we lack an honor system we cannot possibly make a Fantasy Asia setting. Fantasy Europe, no problem, but Fantasy Asia? That requires an in-depth and detailed honor system that includes how you drink your tea and everything else.

 

[Mercurius]

Interesting to note that Medieval knights aren't the default warrior in D&D, probably because the primarily influences of D&D are Tolkien, Howard, and other pre-1974 fantasy authors. I may be wrong, but I don't think the 1E OA had a primary influence in literature, which is probably why its historical faux pas are more awkward.

 

[Staffan]

But then they go and the write a setting with Asian themes-- suddenly, even though roughly an identical feudal system with extremely similar rules existed in Europe, it is only then that the writers feel the need to explicitly impose the details of the feudal system onto the setting. Suddenly, because it is set in an Asian-based setting, social class is massively influenced and players need to be from a particular social class or be denied tons of rights. Their relation to the "imperial system" is heavily emphasized and the it is explicitly detailed what the player's privileges, state-sanctioned powers and personal responsibilities are.

I blame Shogun (book and TV series).

Shogun was a big part in setting off the obsession with Japan in the 80s, and it portrays a Japan that's still extremely feudalistic compared to the 17th century English society from which the viewpoint character comes. This then colored the way Westerners expected Japan to be portrayed for a long time.

 

[Panda-s1]

Yes, all of this and like we were discussing earlier. Knights had codes of honor, nobility did, ect. Honor was a big thing in certain european cultures.

But, if we lack an honor system we cannot possibly make a Fantasy Asia setting. Fantasy Europe, no problem, but Fantasy Asia? That requires an in-depth and detailed honor system that includes how you drink your tea and everything else.

??? no?

I blame Shogun (book and TV series).

Shogun was a big part in setting off the obsession with Japan in the 80s, and it portrays a Japan that's still extremely feudalistic compared to the 17th century English society from which the viewpoint character comes. This then colored the way Westerners expected Japan to be portrayed for a long time.

to my understanding Toshiro Mifune actually received a lot of flack from Japanese audiences for being in Shogun, and the show itself wasn't well by them either.

 

[Chaosmancer]

??? no?

Sadly, someone did make that claim. I don't know why they thought it was so, but the two things were so entertwined for them that that was the case. Can't remember who it was though