Running a Multicultural, Multilingual Roleplaying Group

[Tyler Do'Urden]

So, a few months ago I thought it unlikely I'd ever play or DM again. I'd sold my books years ago; I hadn't played since I graduated from college in 2005. While I lived in the states I continued to pick up Dungeon (RIP ) from time to time, and browse ENworld now and then, but, like many, I thought that roleplaying, as much as I loved it, wasn't going to follow me into the Real (TM) World. Especially given that two years ago, I up and moved to Shanghai.

Well, a few weeks ago a co-worker- the sort of guy I'd never suspect of being a roleplayer- slipped it to me that he'd been playing for years, and wanted to start a group. I agreed to DM- if he could find the players. Two weeks later, we've printed some 3.5 manuals, acquired dice, drawn up some characters, and found plenty of would-be players.

Just one problem- most of the players are Chinese. They speak and read English, but hardly at the level an RPG manual is written in (we've sold them on the idea that D&D is a great vocabulary builder- I learned more linguistic roots, historical and scientific terms, as well as colorful adjectives, by playing D&D than anywhere else). On top of that, the cultural assumptions are often very different. They've all watched Lord of the Rings and Harry Potter, and played some World of Warcraft, Final Fantasy and other CRPG's, so I have some frame of reference to "hang" things on, and I'm printing out pictures of crucial monsters, characters, etc., but there are still a million things that I forget.

So, my questions to those in the know:
1. Were the D&D 3E/3.5 core books translated into Chinese? I haven't found them so far, but I'm still searching; a year ago I talked to a student at my training center who had played a Chinese edition of D&D.
2. Any suggestions for making things easier to understand for people of limited English fluency (we're not talking speakers of "Tarzan" English here; these are educated businesspeople with a fairly high level of fluency- they're just innundated by new and strange terminology- a terminlogy famous for confounding intelligent native speakers at that)? Foreign ENWorlders might have more to say here.
3. My co-worker is looking for simple role-playing systems he can use as a training and teaching tool. We use a lot of role-playing exercises in mock business settings (like fake sales presentations and board meetings); I've often joked that being an overseas business trainer is a lot like being paid to DM (if you're interested, it's an easy field to get into and, adjusted for cost of living, fairly lucrative- if you're willing to move to Asia). He's looking for a simple system- superheroes, fantasy, martial arts, doesn't matter- that might be good for running an ongoing social game in the afternoons at our center.

Anything else you'd like to contribute is welcome as well.

 

[DrunkonDuty]

Wow. Good luck with all that. Sounds like a blast and a challenge.

As to useful advice... not much comes to me.

Re. English comprehension I'd say just try to use simple words and be willing and ready to field lots of questions about vocab.

How familiar are you with Chinese fantasy/mythology? I'm sure that running a Chinese based game would make things easier for new players to understand. See if you an track down movies like Chinese Ghost Story 1-3. (That's the English translation of the title obviously, no idea what they're called originally.) Some crazy wuxia martial arts and demon-ghosts galour. Oodles of fun. And as a proud plunderer of history for plots/settings I suggest reading up on some Chinese history. Bound to plenty of inspiration there for you that your players will have a good handle on already.

Hmmm, all my advice seems to be of the 'work harder' category. Sorry about that.

good luck with it!

 

[Mathew_Freeman]

I'd suggest Wushu as a game, actually. It's available for free and is pretty simple.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wushu_(role-playing_game)

Be warned, the offical home page of the game is no longer up, but you should be able to find a free copy of the rules online. I can't find my copy but they are around.

Other than that, all I can offer is my best wishes, and to think about running a game that is culturally better aimed at your players (which is good advice for any game). However, of course, if they WANT to be challenged then that's a different story entirely...

 

[Theo R Cwithin]

This is too cool! I've always wanted to do this with some of my students! (oh, and sorry for the long post!)

Sounds like most of your players will have some idea of what roleplaying games are, at least at the level of WoW, with hitpoints, classes and all that? I don't know about a Chinese PHB, but you might want to shy away from standard DnD at first, just because it's so BIG - especially if you're selling the game as a language learning opportunity. If you're aiming for D&D3.x, maybe start with Microlite20: at only 2 pages for the "intro" rules, I suspect intermediate+ students won't have much trouble reading them. And at that level of complexity, you can teach the game basics in a few minutes, whip up a few characters, and get an adventure started - and leave the rules sheet for them to peruse later.

As for the language, I wouldn't worry too much about the vocab beyond the basics (eg, what's on the character sheet) and generally useful things (like relevant phrasals and collocations like "roll dice", idiomatic expressions, etc). Things like "glaive" and "manticore" probably aren't too important for their careers I'm sure they'll ask any questions they have. What's more, this is a nice natural language opportunity to practice talking "around" unknown words: if they don't know the word, they'll have to describe it or define it, just like they'd have to do anywhere outside the classroom.

For the cultural frames of reference, that's a little tougher. Again, with their filom and gaming background, they may already "get" standard D&D. If you're pretty familiar with Chinese mythology and history, you could try to aim that direction with appropriate reskinning of the basic archetypal PC classes. Or you could go with a setting like Arabian Knights or pseudo-Africa, where no one at the table has the "cultural advantage". Or you could just start off the whole program with a little convo session about the idea of "hero", superstition, action movies, or whatever; then segue into gaming; then get them to tell you what genre they're interested in.

This sounds like a big, but thoroughly awesome project. Keep us posted!

 

[Dannyalcatraz]

1. Were the D&D 3E/3.5 core books translated into Chinese? I haven't found them so far, but I'm still searching; a year ago I talked to a student at my training center who had played a Chinese edition of D&D.

Not that I know of.

2. Any suggestions for making things easier to understand for people of limited English fluency (we're not talking speakers of "Tarzan" English here; these are educated businesspeople with a fairly high level of fluency- they're just innundated by new and strange terminology- a terminlogy famous for confounding intelligent native speakers at that)? Foreign ENWorlders might have more to say here.

Patience and E-mail.

I was in a multicultural MBA program, and many of my teammates on various group projects were ESL (English as a second language)- I worked with Chinese, Japanese, Brazilian and various African and South Americans. Sometimes, I was the only native English speaker on the team.

While verbal communication was pretty good, I often found myself volunteering to be the copy-editor for our submissions- too many times, they couldn't quite express in print what they could in person.

Start slowly, explaining the core concepts verbally, possibly providing simplified examples. You may also wish to simplify certain things, like the weapons lists, just to avoid the terminology barrage.

As a standing HR, you might want to let people redo their characters without penalty for the first 3 sessions or so- sometimes, you just don't understand what you've done with your PC until you've played him.

Give everyone your e-mail to ask for clarification.

If you're committed to running 3.X, you may also wish to include some source material they may be more familiar with- Oriental Adventures (updated to 3.5 in Dragon #318) and Rokugan may be easier for them to grasp- even though they're essentially the same as the PHB- just because some of the concepts within will resonate a bit better, more of the weapons and visuals will be familiar. They'll also add a lot of more familiar nomenclature- they may better understand what a 2HD sword is after you say its essentially a European Katana, for instance. (And overall, the books will probably prove to be just as distorted to them as the PHB classes are to lovers of European history.)

OTOH, there are other systems out there that may be more accessible. Lot5R and other Asian-centric games might work. Exalted has merit, as does Scion. Toolkit systems, while complex, generally run smoothly after PC gen. Another choice would be to run a game in a system based on fiction they're already familiar with: as I recall, LotR, Harry Potter, Buffy tVS, Star Trek, Star Wars, and many other "franchises" have RPGs, and familiarity with the source fiction may facilitate learning the game material.

3. My co-worker is looking for simple role-playing systems he can use as a training and teaching tool. We use a lot of role-playing exercises in mock business settings (like fake sales presentations and board meetings); I've often joked that being an overseas business trainer is a lot like being paid to DM (if you're interested, it's an easy field to get into and, adjusted for cost of living, fairly lucrative- if you're willing to move to Asia). He's looking for a simple system- superheroes, fantasy, martial arts, doesn't matter- that might be good for running an ongoing social game in the afternoons at our center.

One of the simplest quality RPGs of all time was Metagames' The Fantasy Trip. It is one of the foundational games that eventually evolved into GURPS but it is long OoP. (FWIW, I lovt TFT, but hate GURPS- go figure!)

However, someone else on these boards pointed out to me that a company has essentially revived TFT in a slightly altered form at this website:

http://www.darkcitygames.com/display.php?series=law&id=19

Beyond that, I'd go for a toolkit system: HERO, M&M, GURPS. As I recall, each one has either some stripped-down rules or quick-start PC gen systems, and their flexibility means you can do almost anything with only 1 book, which minimizes costs- meaning both $$$ AND time investments in learning the systems.

 

[S'mon]

Re culture, I think if you haven't got the 'internal aspect' on a culture, it's best just to ignore it. Run the game within your own cultural frame of reference, being willing to explain stuff if necessary. Anything else risks coming over condescending. European & American players are usually fine with playing Samurai, fighting for the daimyo. From what I know of Chinese players, they have no problem with playing a Tolkien campaign where they're Men of the West standing against the Orcs and the Easterling hordes.

 

[S'mon]

I do remember one time experiencing a cultural break-down, due to lack of shared imaginative space. We were playing Pool, a heavy-Narrativism game, with a German GM and two British players, me & Randomling. Randomling and me shared a common conception of modern British industrial-estate urban blight that was alien to the GM's experience, and left her at a loss. But that kind of thing is far less likely to be a problem in a non-Nar game and in a fantasy game. All cultures I think have heroes & villains, war and monsters, and magic of some sort.

 

[Nifft]

I say go tactical combat-heavy at first. RP'ing is a tricky thing even within a single language, but history has shown that humans of all cultures enjoy stabbing things and taking stuff.

Men of the West standing against the Orcs and the Easterling hordes.

Asia is one place where this particular trope might be sub-optimal. But yeah, I agree that inserting them into your own (fictional) culture is better than trying to learn everyone else's cultural background and using each one without giving offense.

Cheers, -- N

 

[Ravellion]

I say go tactical combat-heavy at first. RP'ing is a tricky thing even within a single language, but history has shown that humans of all cultures enjoy stabbing things and taking stuff.

Asia is one place where this particular trope might be sub-optimal. But yeah, I agree that inserting them into your own (fictional) culture is better than trying to learn everyone else's cultural background and using each one without giving offense.

Cheers, -- N

Couldn't you just change the direction the hordes come from? Something like mounted hob-goblin horse archers coming from the north?

 

[tenkar]

I would go retro-clone before I'd go 3.5 for my D&D in this case. For one, the rules are generally free in PDF format. Secondly, they are much simpler then what you you'd be using in 3.5. You don't want to overwhelm them from the start because you risk losing them from the start.

My suggestion? Swords & Wizardry. Why? Simplified rules thay evoke the original D&D ruleset. That shouldn't overwhelm new players. More importantly, the author has the rules in both PDF and Word formats. Word format means you can edit it, maybe even insert translations for your players, directly into the document.

Swords & Wirzardry DL Page