D&D 5E What should an official Indian subcontinent inspired setting have?

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I can still have my Pulpy/Pulp Heroic Bollywood right?

Well, you got the leading man from Eternals at least. And he already has Eldritch Blast.

 

[LuisCarlos17f]

The companies and the megacorporations are the first ones who want their products to be bought by everybody, not only Caucasian straight males. One of the best of D&D is players learning to work together with different people, even those annoying kenders. D&D is being designed to be more cosmopolitan, and that is right. We have to respect everybody, but sometimes even with your best intentions and efforts somebody may be offended. For example if you show in Ixalan a vampire wearing a morrion, then there are complains by the vampires saying these hate the morrion, because this was wore by the "tercios" (Spanish infantery unit for the Hamburgs dinasty) terminates almost all vampires in the know world. (Disclaimer: I was kidding!).

Some times in the name of political correction somebody starts to ask, demand, too much, and in the name of the good sense we have to say "stop".

My suggestion is to use positive incentives to drive people to the right people. Rewards can convince more than the menace of punishments.

"The Jungle Book" is set in India, but written by a British. "Legends of al-Ahlambra" is set in Granada (Southeast Spain) and written by Washintong Irving, a Northamerican.

* Why not an actual-play show with Asian players?

*Any idea about PC races besides vanaras?

 

[Malmuria]

sadly, the life expectancy of human beings are finite and if I create a game with a setting based heavily on 14th century Paris I cannot reference any lived experience.

But I might recommend that you visit Paris, which thankfully still exists. Walk past the architecture from that time period that still stands, walk past and through important sites to see how they relate to one another, get a sense of what the weather is like. To be clear, you wouldn't do this out of some ethical obligation to contemporary Parisians, but because it might improve the quality of your own writing and imagination. To the extent there is an ethics here, it is to avoid obnoxious stereotypes that reduce or degrade people, or have been used violently in the past.

In sum, if you want to use, say, non Western cultures in your rpg game
1. Yes, do it
2. Try not to be a dick about it
3. Do some research
4. If you are a publisher, consider hiring from under-represented groups, in all capacities.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

In sum, if you want to use, say, non Western cultures in your rpg game
1. Yes, do it
2. Try not to be a dick about it
3. Do some research
4. If you are a publisher, consider hiring from under-represented groups, in all capacities.

5. Don't be a lazy writer who avoids doing research and uses tired, or outright bigoted, stereotypes and tropes instead. Yes, some out there are the racist asses they sound like, but most are just lazy, indifferent, ignorant, or all three.

 

[Tonguez]

Well here we go

Inside India’s nascent Dungeons and Dragons communities

The Dungeons and Dragons fandom in India is growing fast, nurtured by volunteer-led collectives. It has offered players a rare sense of respite during the pandemic

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Site Suspended - This site has stepped out for a bit

 

[MGibster]

But I might recommend that you visit Paris, which thankfully still exists. Walk past the architecture from that time period that still stands, walk past and through important sites to see how they relate to one another, get a sense of what the weather is like.

I might be getting a little too hung up on your use of "lived experience." Walking down a street in Paris in 2022 is not the same as walking down the streets of Paris in 1350. The wide boulevards of today's Paris were created in the mid 19th century as a way to thwart protesting mobs and revolutionaries from being able to easily barricade and gain control of the streets. They didn't exist in the 14th century.

But I don't think it really matters. Role playing games aren't a product of academia and it's not appropriate to hold them to such standards. You don't need to go to India to create a game based on the Gupta Empire anymore than I need to go to Paris to create a game setting based on 14th century France.

 

[Alzrius]

It's kind of incredible that Islam, for example, despite being a huge part of the history of that subcontinent, hasn't been mentioned, by any posters so far except very obliquely.

As an aside, the best version of "fantasy Islam" I've seen for an RPG was in Frog God Games' Dunes of Desolation (affiliate link). It essentially filed the serial numbers off, putting forward that there was a particular individual in antiquity who presented a new religious dogma to four adherents, each of whom in turn put their own spin on what they'd been told, which are now four distinct sects of the same religion (and each of which has several cults that interpret things differently as well).

Basically, it kept the thematic presentation and little else, essentially making it an "inspired by" version; I suspect that was probably the best way to go about it, rather than anything more literal.

 

[Enevhar Aldarion]

I might be getting a little too hung up on your use of "lived experience." Walking down a street in Paris in 2022 is not the same as walking down the streets of Paris in 1350. The wide boulevards of today's Paris were created in the mid 19th century as a way to thwart protesting mobs and revolutionaries from being able to easily barricade and gain control of the streets. They didn't exist in the 14th century.

But I don't think it really matters. Role playing games aren't a product of academia and it's not appropriate to hold them to such standards. You don't need to go to India to create a game based on the Gupta Empire anymore than I need to go to Paris to create a game setting based on 14th century France.

People still set their fantasy games in a pre-Renaissance era? Even D&D does not do that any more. I hope.

 

[Malmuria]

I might be getting a little too hung up on your use of "lived experience." Walking down a street in Paris in 2022 is not the same as walking down the streets of Paris in 1350. The wide boulevards of today's Paris were created in the mid 19th century as a way to thwart protesting mobs and revolutionaries from being able to easily barricade and gain control of the streets. They didn't exist in the 14th century.

But I don't think it really matters. Role playing games aren't a product of academia and it's not appropriate to hold them to such standards. You don't need to go to India to create a game based on the Gupta Empire anymore than I need to go to Paris to create a game setting based on 14th century France.

Yes, obviously it will not be the same experience, that's the way time works.

I suppose that I'll just speak for myself: if I'm writing creatively (rpgs included) about a medieval English castle, my work will benefit from actually visiting one. Not because it provides the exact same lived experience obviously, but it does add depth to my own understanding and gives me an experience to draw from, not replacing, but in addition to researching castles or reading stories that involve castles.

 

[MGibster]

People still set their fantasy games in a pre-Renaissance era? Even D&D does not do that any more. I hope.

Eh, D&D isn't really set in any specific period. It's a mishmash of all sorts of different eras and cultures.