CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.
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@Cupcake Those are reasons we should want games in different settings. A character like yours in a modern city wouldn't even raise eyebrows for example, so the whole concept is different.
As for historical accuracy, that's why an 'alternate' Victorian-era is crucial. I don't want to have to care about who was Prime Minister at the time.
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@Cupcake said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
What I hazily recall is that staff felt that not enough people were comfortable with the period setting and its conventions.
Sounds right. I was also really meh on the change, because I had made an "Egyptologist"--basically tomb robber--turned Mystagogue. A 100-year-plus timeskip completely changes the nature of archaeology and the cultural perceptions of a character who engages in that form of it, and the "unambiguously bad" of modern time was a lot less interesting to me than pushing up against the colonialist perspective with a side of Mystagogue artifact-rehoming entitlement too.
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@Arkandel I think @Cupcake is basically right. I recall that people were uncomfortable with the historicity of the setting -- I heard several people express that they just weren't clear on how they should behave IC, not just in terms of attitudes that people find awkward or uncomfortable today but in terms of everyday language and behavior. "How are we supposed to talk?" is a pretty basic question, and if people don't have an answer they feel comfortable with it's going to be problematic.
Now, that kind of thing is catnip to me, and I really enjoyed researching the manners and mores and clothing styles and societal conventions of that time, but I can understand why people might be a little leery of it.
I don't think timeshifting was originally the plan; I think they intended to keep it Victorian. But I have no real proof of that, aside from having seen no sign of it in the game's background material.
I enjoyed playing a convention-challenging (though less so than @Cupcake's!) character in that environment, but I also felt a tiny bit weird about doing so. I'm not sure how to explain, except perhaps that I felt like I should have been conventional rather than a challenge to it.
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For the record, if a Victorian era WoD game (or just a Victorian set theme of virtually any stripe) does happen, I'll probably be there with bells on.
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@Autumn said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
I heard several people express that they just weren't clear on how they should behave IC, not just in terms of attitudes that people find awkward or uncomfortable today but in terms of everyday language and behavior. "How are we supposed to talk?" is a pretty basic question, and if people don't have an answer they feel comfortable with it's going to be problematic.
Having peeked some at KD's wiki, I think borrowing a page from their policy (at least in part?) may help here.
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They have a PILE of resource information about the world/setting available.
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They have a policy that notes, summarizesd, "Don't be a nit-picking dick about people making unintentional IC faux pas based on the trivia, and don't passive-aggressively 'correct' people on these points". (At least that's the read of it I got.)
This is good stuff, and they are an excellent example to follow for settings outside everyday experience. Lay out some basics for the alternate history, throw in some links to important current events in real history if you're keeping them, and encourage people to explore this -- but encourage them to do so without the fear of someone being a self-righteous windbag getting in their face about it if they goof.
That last bit really is pretty huge. People are a lot more willing to try new things if they are aware that the environment does not coddle mean-spirited pedantry flung at them if they make an error.
Think of it in terms of learning a new language. If all the native speakers sneered and started mocking you when you flubbed a word, sure, you might learn that word -- but what you really learned is that all the native speakers are assholes.
Oh fucking well.
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@surreality said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
Think of it in terms of learning a new language. If all the native speakers sneered and started mocking you when you flubbed a word, sure, you might learn that word -- but what you really learned is that all the native speakers are assholes.
It's true, though. French people are assholes.
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I think others have covered it, but modern-isms are going to work their way in. PCs will always want to break conventions and norms. I played on Victorian Reverie & The Greatest Game briefly and I found myself stilfed and hamped in two ways:
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I play female Characters
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I play non -white characters
Generally speaking, I had to try and figure out what made sense for the era, and then work within it. And that became harder, when you did the actual research and found out... well there are exceptions, but they were like.. connected to Queen Victoria ( a young woman of African descent was her goddaughter, or ward, and it looked awesome, and then realize... she's only pictured and dressed all 'proper' because she was the QUEEN's Ward.)
Kind of hard to pull off, in a MUSH.
But something to consider. As someone said: Women's Lib was farther along in this alternative timeline? Did they pull a (was it Finland?) basically al lthe women just stopped working, stopped boning and said: We'd like our rights now, no sex, no work is done until we have them. And the men gave in REALLY quickly.)
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@Songtress
My thoughts on an alternate Victorian England? Play up the tropes you see in the Dracula novel. Make the women pushing the envelope in such a way that gets to the boundary but not over it, which might cause social controversy but not otherwise. The same goes for people of color; slavery was abolished in the British Empire in 1834, so you could easily build upon that depending on what year(s) the game is potentially being set around. -
@Songtress This is a re-paste of an earlier post I made regarding just that very issue:
Yeah I'm going to address that (and the rampant racism) via the Alternative History aspect. Women's Suffrage became a national movement in 1872 with the formation of the National Society for Women's Suffrage and later the more influential National Union of Women's Suffrage Societies (NUWSS). Things got put on hold for WW-I, so I'll advance the timeline and have it occur earlier. I can then use it as a rational for players to relocate to the London setting rather than a hindrance. I.E., relocate from France or Germany because women had equal right in England.
To expand a bit, for THIS setting, I intend to begin the game with things in rather dire straights for London due to disease and a societal breakdown. Its on the tip of all falling apart. In that sort of environment, and given the paragraph above, I don't think female characters and minorities would suffer the same level of restrictions as their real life (historically speaking) counterparts.
In other words, the population will have other things to worry about besides an Asian woman wearing pants and a katana.
Especially when the REAL apocalypse starts.
Having said all that, I don't want to create a game in which we play like characters born in this century but plopped into the 1880s. So there needs to be a balance without restricting character concepts from working. Particularly female and minority characters. My solution is to advance the timeline for Women's Suffrage but I'd welcome alternatives.
“It takes many sheep to satisfy one wolf.”
― Nenia Campbell, Horrorscape -
I think I am going to have problems with a woman in pants being called Victorian, knowing why it was called that. Now if it were Edwrdian, sure, but are you okay with accelerating to the 1920s? People could use Elizabeth from Bioshock Infinite as a played-by. Win-win? Hell, the Little Black Dress was invented in the Edwardian era.
Maybe that's the true apocalypse?
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Elizabeth from Bioshock! I'd play that in a.. heartbeat! a Columbia/Rapture hybrid in its prime.
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@Songtress said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
But something to consider. As someone said: Women's Lib was farther along in this alternative timeline? Did they pull a (was it Finland?) basically al lthe women just stopped working, stopped boning and said: We'd like our rights now, no sex, no work is done until we have them. And the men gave in REALLY quickly.)
It's a tough balancing act but yes, it should be made very clear what's thematically acceptable, tolerated, frowned-upon and all-but-illegal - or actually illegal. Exceptions can still be made since IC these lines are blurry at any era but the broad strokes have to be well defined so players know where they stand.
I think it's crucial to draw these line somewhere that's not too liberal - nowhere near modern standards - but allows female and foreign character concepts to be successfully pulled off. If women can't be in public without a chaperone for example, even if it was thematic, it'd be pretty damn annoying so for gameplay reasons if nothing else. However make it too comfortable and it might as well be a modern setting with slightly different clothes and technology which is probably not the desired state either.
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Why is 'how women and minorities are treated' the benchmark for making a game 'historical enough'? Why do we need to focus on exploring that particular aspect of history to make the experience authentic? It rather bothers me that it's being said that if it's too comfortable to play a woman, it's too modern? Why can this aspect not be changed, as the game designer has expressed?
Vampires are awesome but don't you dare give women too many rights or my fun, my fun!
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@Sunny I agree with this in one way, and don't in another.
I can see the hurdles feeling oppressive for players who don't want to have to hassle with them.
I can also see them as being an appeal, on some level. As in, "It would be a challenge to play X in the social environment of the time period, and that challenge is appealing to me."
So I can see why people with the latter approach would find things 'too modernized' on that front a downer.
I'm not sure if there's a mid-way balance to be struck there -- but it would be hard to please both sets of folks there without it. A recent change might have holdouts that cling to their old ways and provide the challenge factor people are seeking, while providing a freer environment (and no IC legal strictures that can be brought down on someone like a hammer) to those seeking that.
It'd then be on the players who are seeking those different RP experiences to work with the setting to make the character that fits the experience you're looking for. For instance, if the 'freedoms' are more embraced by the merchant classes, and you don't want to hassle with those stresses, make a merchant class character, etc.
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@Sunny said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
Why is 'how women and minorities are treated' the benchmark for making a game 'historical enough'?
I think this is because this is where the largest disconnect is. The truth is that many of us have no personal experience of the prejudice that minorities felt back in these days; we only believe what we read from accounts of that time.
I otherwise largely agree with you. There's no reason why the game designers could simply kibosh the discussion.
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I just feel like there are a million different things that set it apart as not-modern, cultural aspects that can be played up, things that folks can focus on. Seems fucked up to me to make 'women must not have too many rights' the hill to die on for authenticity.
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@Sunny It was an example of something that would affect gameplay and theme at the same time. I'll refrain, my apologies.
- He who takes offense when not intended is a fool. He who takes offense when intended is a greater fool.
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@Sunny said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
I just feel like there are a million different things that set it apart as not-modern, cultural aspects that can be played up, things that folks can focus on. Seems fucked up to me to make 'women must not have too many rights' the hill to die on for authenticity.
Looked at it from another way -- maybe from @surreality's perspective -- women fighting for rights could be a central trope to play with on the game. You'd just need players willing to push back to make it interesting.
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I think having the legal obstacles gone is important. If people want to play the struggle, there are ways. There are always backward folk around. If the change is recent, especially so.
Think of the backlash now in terms of LGBT rights as a parallel; some but not all rights are present, and the swing is toward equality, but there's also backlash and constant chaos surrounding the issue.
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@Arkandel said in CoD - Victorian - Penny Dreadful-ish.:
@Sunny It was an example of something that would affect gameplay and theme at the same time. I'll refrain, my apologies.
Hey, it wasn't you, it was the direction of the conversation, sorry to single out a few of your key words. I play a sexist as fuck character on KD where women don't have all the rights, and it's actually more frustrating to me than playing someone oppressed would be because oh my god the backlash when my character dares to suggest someone should be putting the sword down and having babies. It's not particularly fun, and I would much rather see a game that sidestepped this issue entirely unless someone actively wants the rp.
