D&D General Why Do You Prefer a Medieval Milieu For D&D? +

[Reynard]

This is a subject that comes up in other threads relatively often, but I feel like we usually talk around it rather than about it. So I thought I would start a thread asking directly:

For those that do*, why do you prefer a medieval fantasy milieu for your D&D games? Why do you want castles and kings and thatch roofed villages, knights and towers and chain? Why do you not want firearms or printing presses, trains or airships?

*This is NOT a thread where you talk about why you don't want a medieval milieu. Nor is it one where you argue with people about their preferences. Hence the +.

 

[Warpiglet-7]

Nice topic! My group really only likes this sort of fantasy for RPGs!

We played around with star frontiers, gamma world, phoenix command marvel superherors
And a few others, but all prefer the myths of D&D and the warfare of “times gone by.”

Is it authentic to the time period? Not as much as we pretend to think.

Of note we historically had fun with battletech, Star Trek ship to ship combat (lighter starfleet battles), some starfleet battles, etc. so it’s not aversion to sci fi…just a preference for medieval in an rpg!

But for RPGs, I think it’s the sword fights and imagining taking on bad odds in hand to hand combat. And the myths and monsters that just seem to fit here too

 

[jmartkdr2]

Some advantages to generic-fantasy-medieval-ish:

1. Lots of known tropes: you don't nee to invent or explain a lot of things, because generic fantasy is well understood. This includes some really important stuff like pc options, enemies, and why adventuring is a thing. They're just already solved.

(the opposite is: you need to somehow do a big lore dump before play begins, explaining what barags, toonikis, fergarins, thakalils and dunamagers are, and the differences between soldiers, warriors, fighters, and battlers, and why you can't just orbital bombard all your problems, or players won't even be able to begin making characters.)

2. Swords are cool in a way blasters just aren't.

3. Because swords, combat can take place on a reasonably-sized map.

4. Dragons

But mostly it's just because the alternatives are usually a lot of work.

 

[TiQuinn]

I don’t know that I prefer it but I will say that it makes it easier (or made it easier) when dealing with generic adventures like in the old Dungeon Magazines. Much easier to adapt when you had a quasi-medieval baseline versus something where you had to strip out elements that maybe don’t work with your campaign.

 

[Cadence]

For those that do*, why do you prefer a medieval fantasy milieu for your D&D games? Why do you want castles and kings and thatch roofed villages, knights and towers and chain? Why do you not want firearms or printing presses, trains or airships?

I think mostly because my formative fantasy fiction didn't have them and most of my years of D&D didn't (with maybe a stray F-14 or two when I was much younger and now a few early handguns in the game my son is in). I have read a variety of short stories lately that explore those things and so who knows...

The big ones for me is that my brain works best running the game without too much communication/spying, teleporting, and intangibility technology/magic. If those things are present my brain always jumps to shortcuts and wipes out the plots I was imagining as posibilities.

Is it authentic to the time period? Not as much as we pretend to think.

I always find it interesting how much our fantasy misleads us on what was invented when.

D&D General - Technology in D&D, the IRL Timeline, and Pausing It.

The issue of different inventions and discoveries comes up in threads now and then (why not have gun powder? what makes a world believable? shouldn't usual physics and chemistry work by default? etc...). And so I was wondering today about when different inventions came about/became widely used...

www.enworld.org

But for RPGs, I think it’s the sword fights and imagining taking on bad odds in hand to hand combat. And the myths and monsters that just seem to fit here too

Also agree with this.

 

[Tales and Chronicles]

I prefer science fantasy myself, so medieval tropes with modern or futuristic elements.

Final Fantasy 5/7/8/10/12/13/15 is way more my style than The Witcher or GoT

 

[Incenjucar]

I grew up using guns and I am very, very bored with them. They also take the skill out of things; a child can kill with a gun as easily as an adult. Not the biggest fan of crossbows, either, but they at least require some work with a crank.

 

[Oofta]

Lots of myths and legends to pull from and be inspired by. Not the real world so if we're fuzzy on the details most people don't realize. Common tropes and archetypes but still a lot of wiggle room. Close range combat is more fun for a lot of people than playing a game where you're sniping at each other from half a mile away or dropping bombs. Disconnected enough from the real world that we can let our imaginations run free without having to think to hard about how things actually work.

The problems with modern world is that it's easier to step on toes and represent things a little too closely to someone's political or religious beliefs. We know how the real world works and it would lead to more question of "why didn't they just [fill in the blank]".

Problems with sci-fi is that it gets so outdated unless it's science fantasy. If it's harder sci-fi it's incredibly difficult to do it right and make it believable because we look at todays tech and extrapolate. Look at how outdated a show from the 70s would look now.

Last, but not least, books I grew up reading.

 

[MGibster]

For those that do*, why do you prefer a medieval fantasy milieu for your D&D games? Why do you want castles and kings and thatch roofed villages, knights and towers and chain? Why do you not want firearms or printing presses, trains or airships?

Mainly because firearms, trains, the printing press, and airships take me out of the fantasy. There are exceptions of course, Warhammer Fantasy's Empire is closer to early modern Europe complete with full plate, firearms, and canons and I quite enjoy it.

 

[Krachek]

Almost renaissance, like 1450. But no firearm. Absolutely no firearm.
Dark medieval is too close for nice adventure.
I want, guilds, travels, university, factions.
I don’t want creepy medieval where everything was on the hold and anguish.

Do I need train, not really. Airship, not really. Ships are enough. If we need better we go straight to teleportation.

As for firearm, having a d10 pistol and d12 musket is kind lame. It’s not firearm it is a dice roll.