Paladin Kits - Ranked and Reviewed!

First there was The Complete Fighter's Handbook. Then there was another one of it. It was called The Complete Thief's Handbook. Then there was another one of it. It was called The Complete Priest's Handbook. Then there was another one of it. It was called...

OK, to cut a long story short, eventually there was a Complete Paladin's Handbook. And by this point the exercise had become somewhat perfunctory, somewhat by-the-numbers, somewhat phoned-in. There are only so many times it is possible to think up variations on the theme of 'Paladins have to be lawful good', and only so much that can be gained from discourses on how to find holy mounts or on the physical manifestations of paladins' detect evil intent abilities (tingly fingertips? toothache? migraine? excess wind?). 

Nonetheless, the authors - as with all the other 'Completes' - did attempt to come up with a list of paladin sub-classes ('kits') to provide some variation on the bog-standard paladin theme. I have to confess that, while I nowadays have little patience for either complicated character generation or optionality for its own sake, as an adolescent I lapped this sort of thing up, and spent hours and hours alone in my bedroom coming up with PCs based on the various kits in the different Complete books. As I remember it the Druid and Ranger handbooks were the more imaginative; I had few memories of the Paladin kits, but recently took another look at that book in connection with the Paladin Project and refreshed my memory. I thought it would be fun to write up some reviews and rank the various options.

The way this works is as follows. Each kit is given a rating (out of 5 Lucerne hammers) for distinctiveness, gameability and flavour. Distinctiveness means how much of a USP the kit has in comparison to the other kids (or other character classes for that matter). Gameability means how, well, gameable the kit is - would it actually be fun or interesting to play. And flavour means how interesting and imaginative the concept is to begin with. At the end, all scores are averaged and the kits ranked accordingly.

So, here goes, in alphabetical order.

1. True Paladin. This is the archetypal Paladin as described in the PHB, 'pious and forthright...serv[ing] as the conscience of the party, setting an example of high moral standards and nudging them back on track when they stray from their mission'. It's hard to imagine that this concept could ever be done non-insufferably in practice, isn't it? The True Paladin does what Pladins do - riding about on a horse looking knightly and Lanceloty, and with the abilities one would expect. This is bland, but I suppose the Distinctiveness mark benefits from the fact that it is at least distinct in respect of being the original idea.

Distinctiveness: 3 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 2 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

2. Chevalier. This is, we are told 'a gentleman warrior' who is 'modelled on the knights of the feudal age', being more along the lines of a knight-proper than a knight-who-does-priestly-things. Admittedly, though, the distinction between the Chevalier and the True Paladin is really wafer thin - the main difference being that a Chevalier is definitionally noble by birth, whereas a True Paladin could be anybody ('an orphan whose abilities were granted by a benevolent deity', for example). The other main distinction is that a Chavelier has various duties and rights arising from the fact that he has a lord and is part of a feudal structure. This is lazily done, although it does improve the Gameablity score, as it does open up possibilities for different modes of play - the Chevalier having to operate within a particular social milieu. 

Distinctiveness: 1 Lucerne hammer; Gameability: 3 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

3. Divinate. The Divinate is a warrior-priest type: a smiter of evil who is a 'raging avenger' in battle but a friend to the disadvantaged and impoverished when not. Again, it is difficult to discern what is really all that different about this concept from the True Paladin - the main distinction appearing to be that the Divinate lays more emphasis on theology (his stronghold has to be a monastery, for example). Hence we can indeed probably conceptualise there being a spectrum from Divinate-True Paladin-Chevalier, with Divinate being at the point at which a Paladin shades into a Cleric, and a Chevalier being at the point at which a Paladin shades into a Fighter. Did I mention that the Complete Paladin's Handbook had a feeling having been phoned in?

Distinctiveness: 1 Lucerne hammer; Gameability: 2 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

4. Envoy. This is a skilled diplomat who is sent on missions by his lord or monarch to perform various tasks - delivering a 'banquet invitation to a friendly monarch' or 'opening hostage negotiations with a tribe of cannibals' or even 'representing his country in treaty discussions' or 'venturing into unexplored territories to scout for new trade routes'. I actually quite like this idea - even while wondering what exactly is particularly Paladin-ish about it - and I think a campaign of PCs-as-Envoys would be a lot of fun. Can't quite get 'The Syrians are mad at the Lebanese' out of my head now though. 

Distinctiveness: 4 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 4 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 2 Lucerne hammers

5. Equerry. This is a 'master horseman with a natural affinity for mounts of all species'. This can apparently include more or less anything (giant lizards, giant owls, griffins, etc.), though the rules specifically say that male equerries cannot ride unicorns. Somebody should tell Gene Wolfe! I suppose this is at least a distinctive concept, although it would be annoying to have an Equerry in the party if being played with somebody keen on the rules-as-written, as they are not supposed to like going underground or indoors. 2nd edition was full of this sort of stuff - passably amusing in a character in a novel but only really likely to be irritating in a PC.

Distinctiveness: 3 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 2 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 2 Lucerne hammers

6. Errant. The Errant, as you might expect, is, well a knight-errant - an independent warrior who 'roams the countryside searching for adventure and offering his assistance to any good beings in need'. Again, a campaign of PCs-as-Knight-Errants is one I could see working well as an exemplar of a 'good guy sandbox'. Again, it has to be said, though, that it's difficult discerning what the difference is between this and a True Paladin.

Distinctiveness: 1 Lucerne hammer; Gameability: 4 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

7. Expatriate. The Expatriate (who I think should really be called an Exile) is the converse of the Errant - a Paladin who has been forced to leave home, rather than having taken an oath to go off adventuring. This, we are told, happens when a Paladin is betrayed by the corruption of his lord, patron, order, etc., and therefore has to go ronin in order to stick to his principles. There are role-playing tips agogo here: 'Expatriates are often moody, cynical and bitter...he has little patience with most neutral characters, finding their lack of commitment insipid and contemptible...he crushes his enemies without remorse.' Admit it, as a teenage you would have loved this. Again, as with the Envoy and Errant, this concept would work well if the entire group took on the role, but the Expatriate is one of the few Paladin kits that would fit in with a normal party of PCs doing normal rogueish adventuring things.

Distinctiveness: 3 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 3 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 3 Lucerne hammers

8. Ghosthunter. The name of this kit says it all, really. Yes, it's that Hugh Jackman film with Kate Beckinsale swanning about in tight clothes. A decent idea, although trite, and faces many of the problems associated with these specialised AD&D kits; why is the ghosthunter hanging around with the PCs when they're not hunting ghosts, given that this is what he is supposed to do as his calling? An everything-is-ghosthunters campaign would be eminently achievable, though.

Distinctiveness: 4 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 2 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 3 Lucerne hammers

9. Inquisitor. The Inquisitor, like the Ghosthunter, specialises in fighting evil magicians. Many of the same comments could be made, but I actually like the idea of this kit a lot better. First, it envisions something actually rather different from the standard Paladin model, but second, it also envisions a campaign style that is very attractive - something more investigative and cloak-and-dagger than is normal; one even imagines the PCs inhabiting a city filled with behind-the-scenes demon summoning, cult-formation and evil alchemy.

Distinctiveness: 4 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 4 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 4 Lucerne hammers

10. Medician. This is a Paladin sub-type wo has 'decided she can best uphold her principles by fighting injury and disease'. Expert in herbs, medicines, anatomy and diagnostics, she 'treats the sick, alleviates suffering, and saves lives'. Your patience with playing this concept in a normal PC party will be about the same as that of playing a medtech in a Cyberpunk 2020 party, and the overlap with the cleric is obvious; I suppose it was inevitable that somebody would invent this conceot as a way to fill out a list, but - really?

Distinctiveness: 2 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 1 Lucerne hammer; Flavour: 2 Lucerne hammers

11. Militarist. This is a battle 'virtuoso' of the Benedict-from-the-Amber-books variety - an elite soldier and general, 'shrewd and fearless', who 'naturally assumes a leadership role' in combat. I always have a problem with presenting character classes or kits in this way: shrewdness, for example, is a quality that really derives from the player rather than the PC, as does 'natural leadership' - and, in any event, doesn't this really sound an awful lot like it's just a type of Fighter? 

Distinctiveness: 1 Lucerne hammer; Gameability: 3 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

12. Skyrider. This is a 'warrior of the air' and a 'defender of both the skyways and the earth'. An inevitable concept, but: a) the same thing as an Equerry, specialising in winged mounts, and b) only really workable as long as all the PCs have flying mounts and the campaign is concieved as being, as it were, an 'air war' - gadding about the mountaintops, or between giant trees, or islands floating in a void, or whatever. Not that there's anything wrong with such things. Feels like it ought to be a Ranger, though, quite frankly (and I have a feeling there was even a near-identical Ranger kit...).

Distinctiveness: 3 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 3 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 3 Lucerne hammrs

13. Squire. This is a Paladin who serves another Paladin. A Robin figure who never gets to become Batman. Er...is there anything more to be said? Could provide for some laughs, but serves chiefly as another example of 2nd edition AD&D writers' tendency to dream up concepts for characters that would be good in novels rather than classes that would be good in RPGs.

Distinctiveness: 2 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 2 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

14. Votary. This is, in essence, a Divinate who has a much more militant, extremist attitude - 'grim, self-obsessed and quick to judge'. She 'believes her church is the only true one' and thinks that 'followers of evil faiths...deserve nothing but death'. This would be enjoyable to ham up (again, the writers' emphasis being on what would be fun to role play as) but really indicates a lack of imagination; the text even admits that the Votary and Divinate are more or less the same concept!

Distinctiveness: 1 Lucerne hammer; Gameability: 3 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 1 Lucerne hammer

15. Wyrmslayer. As the name suggests, this is a dragon-slayer. Much can be said here of what was said in relation to the Ghosthunter, mutatis mutandis. But come on. Dragonslayer? You know you love it.

Distinctiveness: 2 Lucerne hammers; Gameability: 4 Lucerne hammers; Flavour: 3 Lucerne hammers

When the kits are ranked, then, we find them ordered as follows:

1. Inquisitor

2. Envoy

3. = Expatriate

3. = Ghosthunter

3. = Skyrider

3. = Wyrmslayer

7. Equerry

8. = Errant

8. = True Paladin

10. = Chevalier

10. = Medician

10. = Militarist

10. = Squire

10. = Votary

15. Divinate

Overall, this is a poor show, I think. Here's an idea - suggest some new ideas in the comments!

The Great North Is Great

In the new year, I will be moving towards a release of a Kickstarter for The Great North, and I am confident that I have enough of a grasp of the logistics, and am at an advanced enough stage of the project (all text and art is complete) to rapidly move from there to fulfilment. 

I will be putting up some teasers in the coming months, but in the meantime I merely wanted to show off some of Tom Kilian's simply exceptional art:

Wraparound front/back cover

The Hardwater

The Map

Joyous Garde

Drummond's Quarter

Cuddy's Well

The Emperor's Meadow

Twice-Bound

Knucker with Lamprey-men

Pwca

Silky and Shelly-coat

Knight-errant

Stuck Gates

Deadyoungestson

Grindylow

Lares

One of the 'zoomed in' maps

The Last Temptation of the DM: Why a Living Breathing World Needs Systematising

Is it possible to create a sandbox that is a 'living, breathing world'?

No. It is possible to create one that to all intents and purposes resembles such a thing. But we fool ourselves if we imagine that paper, dice, pencils and a bit of imagination can actually produce, rather than create a simulacrum of, genuine complexity.

The reason this comes up is that, in a recent post, I made the claim that it was not possible to set up a sandbox in which the PCs are the good guys responding to threats posed by evildoers without a way of systematising how the evildoers behave. There was some pushback on this in the comments, but I stood by my position. If there is not a way of systematising evildoer behaviour - if one just says to oneself, 'Well, I will just treat the evildoers in the sandbox as though they were PCs and ascribe to them motives and agency accordingly' then one will end up producing what is in effect a railroad. What do I mean by this?

Picture a hexmap. And picture a campaign in which the PCs are the 'goodies' - Knights of the Square Table. Their job is to protect the weak from evildoers. They live in Bamelot, where they serve King Marthur. 

For the sake of simplification, let's then say there are three factors of evildoers which you have created. There is the Red Baron and his minions, the Purple Vampire Count, and the Yellow Nosed Dwarfs.

Everything is set up - the hexmap is keyed and populated, Bamelot is filled up with interesting NPCs, etc. The campaign now begins: it's the 1st of January. Now, you want your sandbox to feel as though it is a 'living, breathing world'. So...what happens?

Well, if it is a living, breathing world, what do the Red Baron and his minions, the Purple Vampire Count, and the Yellow Nosed Dwarfs do? They pursue objectives. What are their objectives? Well, let's say the Red Baron, er, wants to abduct King Marthur's daughter because he wants to force her to marry him. And let's say the Purple Vampire Count needs the blood of innocent children to survive. And then let's say the Yellow Nosed Dwarfs want to raid Bamelot's treasure vaults to get King Marthur's gold.

Ok. So what happens now? Hmm. Let's say that the Red Baron sends his flying monkeys to kidnap King Marthur's daughter. And let's say that it will take them about two days to arrive based on distances on the map. Then let's say that the Purple Vampire Count goes off to raid the village of Autumnfield, and it will take five days for him to get there. And then let's say it will take a month for the Yellow Nosed Dwarfs to finish digging their tunnels all the way to Bamelot.

Right. So, in the meantime, what are the PCs doing? Maybe 'going out on patrol'. Maybe consulting the wizard Gerlin about what his soothsaying skills suggest about the emergence of future threats. Let's say they've chosen to go out on patrol. What happens? Hmm. Well, it would be boring if nothing happened when the PCs were out on patrol. So maybe they could get the opportunity to discover clues or hear rumours about flying monkeys, which would then give them the opportunity to pre-empt the Red Baron's kidnap attempt. Or maybe they could encounter some unrelated fourth threat? Or maybe they could get the chance to uncover information that might alert them to the activities of the Purple Vampire Count or the Yellow Nosed Dwarfs...?

Do I need to belabour the point further? I hope not. There is nothing about any of the above that is illegitimate and I do not mean to suggest that this way of playing a game would not be fun, but it is not a 'living, breathing world'. It is a world in which the DM is deciding more or less everything, either on the fly, or in reference to what he has pre-planned or thought up in advance - and, crucially, in light of his own particular tastes. Yes, the PCs do have a bit of agency in how they respond to events as they unfold. But they are really just living out an interaction with whatever the DM happens to think would be appropriate at any given moment. And they will not therefore be interacting with a 'living, breathing world' but in the end reacting to the DM's own implicit or explicit ideas about how he wants the campaign to emerge. What happens does not come about organically but because of what the DM wills, even if what he is willing does take place in response to what the PCs do at a particular time. And what happens in these circumstances will inevitably be led by whatever the DM happens to think would be good, or fun - in reference to his own tastes, desires, and vision.

A little of this is inevitable in a role playing game, as we all know, but by far the more authentic and, I think, rewarding way to simulate the existence of a 'living, breathing world' in such a way as to avoid the DM simply making things up as he goes along is to set up neutral systems of generation and decision-making. Instead of beginning with a Red Baron and a Purple Vampire Count and a tribe of Yellow Nosed Dwarfs, and ascribing to them motives, one instead comes up with a way of generating evildoers and then creating interactions between them, and the world around them, through the use of random tables. One comes up with neutral ways of determining, through the use of dice or other methods, how they pursue their objectives, and when. One creates methods for determining how new threats arise. One creates ways for seasonal and climactic factors to influence events. And so on. One, in other words, systematises as much as possible so as to ensure that the players are not in the end simply 'adventuring' in the DM's own hall of mirrors. 

The result is not a 'living, breathing world' either, but it is one that is much less immediately a representation of the DM's own conceptions of what would be best at any given moment. And that is a world which, while not 'living and breathing', does at least contain space for player agency to develop.

Teaching Tricks to Lego Cars: Being an NPC talking to an NPC

At the pub the other night a friend of mine was recounting an episode from the Tired Parent Wars. Apparently, his young son has got into a routine of taking a handful of lego cars with him into the water at bath time, so they can do 'tricks' in the bath itself (jumps, half-pipes, etc.). My friend was expressing his exasperation at the fact that this has transformed into a situation in which he (the father) has to teach new tricks to the cars and has to do it in an 'in universe' voice - so that he has to talk to the cars like a school teacher and instruct them in what to do, while also being in control of them as they perform the tricks in question. (His son apparently just watches.) 

My friend was recounting what a brain-borking activity this is, and you can understand why. 'Being' a car, as it were, doing tricks, is not too complicated. Nor would it be too complicated to pretend that one is the driver of one of the cars. But there is something about the extra level of creativity that is required to imagine being an instructor of a fictitous person, who one is also pretending to be in control of, that elevates the task beyond the capacities of the frazzled father after a long day at work. 

This spurred me to reflect on what has always struck me to be the most difficult and often most inert and boring aspect of being a DM, which is carrying on a conversation between two NPCs while the PCs listen. Acting the part of an NPC interacting with the PCs is not complicated, and often fun. But to carry on an overheard conversation of any length - say, more than four or five lines of dialogue - between two NPCs and make it interesting (at least without a pre-prepared script) is tough. Generally it is dull; at its worst, it can descend into a much less funny verson of a Tommy Cooper routine:

The only exceptions would appear to be those DMs blessed with genuine acting talent and a range of voices, who are able to dramatise speech between NPCs and hold attention - not by any means straightforward.

Can this skill be cultivated? I suppose it can, and one could even imagine that, blessed with time and inclination, one could practice and hone the ability. Just consult the following table, roll the dice, and see what type of conversation comes up, and then act it out: set yourself a timer (2 minutes, 5 minutes, 10 minutes) and see how long you can keep it going. Though I recommend doing it with nobody else in earshot...

Dice	NPC 1	Wants to	NPC 2
1	Street hoodlum	Intimidate	Street hoodlum
2	Elderly sage		Elderly sage
3	Witch	Seduce	Witch
4	Knight		Knight
5	Ogre	Persuade	Ogre
6	Cat woman		Cat woman
7	Innkeeper	Trick	Innkeeper
8	Mayor		Mayor
9	Urchin	Warn	Urchin
10	Fisherman		Fisherman
11	Farmer	Plot with	Farmer
12	Tavern wench		Tavern wench

But Why Must Evil Barons and Vampire Counts Intervene?

In my most recent post and various others over the years, I made the case that the default OSR-style fantasy sandbox (and I suppose any other kind of sandbox) is ill-suited without modifications to a campaign in which the PCs are, self-consciously or otherwise, 'goodies'. There needs to be a way, I suggested, to systematise the appearances of threats which the PCs-as-goodies then defend against.

This prompted the following comment, on my most recent post:

But, in a game, a vile world is most conducive to PCs being the goodies. You can sandbox a game full of evil barons and vampire counts and the players can fight against it however they choose; if the world is doing well then the DM has to proactively introduce the bad elements, which is just not how this game functions best. That way lies predetermined narrative setups.

I take this to mean that there is in fact no need for any special systematisation or modification to run a 'goodies' sandbox. All you need is to fill a hexmap full of baddies and watch the PCs go out and fight against them. To 'proactively introduce bad elements' on the other hand is 'not how the game functions best' and leads to railroading.

I decided that this comment needed special rebuttal, as doing so will help to elucidate just why it is that fresh systematisation of 'goodies' sandbox gaming is necessary.

Let's go back, crucifixes and garlic in hand, to a time when Zak S was in his pomp and had not yet been declared persona non grata. In an old post from that era, which I can no longer find, Zak made the important and useful observation that there is a point of distinction between campaigns in which the PCs are rogues versus those in which they are heroes. In a campaign in which they are rogues, the PCs start with ready-made motives and can be (I don't remember if Zak put it in these terms) active while the world is passive. The PCs want gold. Off they go into a world of adventure to get it. The DM's job is to set up an interesting landscape - typically a hexmap - populated with various sites where treasure can be found. The PCs are thus the active agents; the landscape is passive - it is to be explored. 

In a heroic campaign, such a setup feels inert. What do heroes do? They don't go about just looking for bad guys to beat up. They protect people. They are much more passive against active threats - Clark Kent happens to notice a bank being robbed, jumps into the nearest phonebox, transforms into Superman, and catches the villains: this is contingent on the villains having taken the active step of robbing the bank in the first place.

The commenter's premise, then - that 'You can sandbox a game full of evil barons and vampire counts and the players can fight against it however they choose' - is, then, not really true. You could make a hexmap full of evil barons and vampire counts, for sure, but then why are the PCs going off into such a hexmap to fight them? Some unsatisfying and implausible conceit might justify it ('the PCs are Evil Hunters and have been tasked by Lord Uzanohakna to go out and smite evil wherever it can be found'), but the result feels bland and inert. One pictures the PCs waking up each morning and deciding between themselves, 'OK, which evil baron shall we go and slay today, then?' The result is fairly one-dimensional and, frankly, not all that heroic. 

No: what I believe is reqiured is a method by which threats are introduced into a sandbox, which the PCs must then deal with as they see fit as protectors or guardians or something of that sort. They live in a region of the world which has its own dangers but which, from time to time, is invaded by evil beings, whether from 'beyond the mountains' or another plane of existence or faerie or whatever, who must be found, rooted out, and destroyed. 

This method must be carefully designed so that the threats which appear are not scripted, are unique, and interact with existing elements of the campaign setting in interesting ways. But this can I think be done, and I indeed came up with the rudiments of such a system here. What is required is a more formal description, with lots of examples and options, and a bit more thought devoted to the subject of how the existence of threats is incorporated into the sandbox itself in an active way, how advancement takes place, and so on. But the basic model of 'you can sandbox a game full of evil barons and vampire counts and the players can fight against it however they choose' is, to my eye, in itself a non-starter. 

Must the World Be Saved?

It is hard to reflect objectively on the nature of a book that is so well-known and which has been so influential as The Lord of the Rings. This means that we rarely, if ever, dwell on how strange it is: since its furniture is still to a large extent the furniture of the entire genre, we accept it as unthinkingly as we accept the decor in our own living rooms.

But the central feature of The Lord of the Rings is far from normal or banal - at its core it rests on positive answers to three questions which other novelists, prior to Tolkien, would rarely if ever have even thought to ask, namely:

1. Is it necessary to save the world?

2. Is it possible to?

3. Is it desirable?

In Tolkien's story, that is, the world is threatened, but it can be saved, however improbably, and it is worth saving. 

These are by no means the obvious answers to those questions, particularly when the questions are not being examined through a filter of Christianity, and ever since Tolkien was writing the major figures of the genre have been rowing back from them. To most genre writers today, save-the-world plots are a bit passe - it either isn't necessary to save the world to begin with (A Song of Ice and Fire; The Scar), is impossible (Lyonesse; Viriconium), or would not be particularly desirable in the first place (Stone Dance of the Chamleon). There are big exceptions, naturally, Gene Wolfe's work being very obviously and explicitly in the Tolkienian tradition, but overall the shift has been towards a much more secularised understanding of the role of humanity in the ongoing existence and justification of The World.

While this has no doubt opened the genre up to more creative applications - nobody would want endless Terry Brooks or Tad Williams retreads, as charming as they can be - the result can sometimes be a rejection of the concept of salvation as such. There is a strong antiheroic strand in modern fantasy writing (and particularly modern fantasy gaming) which rejects the very notion that there may indeed be things beyond the self that are worth saving from some threat - be they a nation, a place, a family, or even a single soul. In OSR gaming in particular the emphasis is almost exclusively on the mere survival or glorification of the individual often set against a backdrop of a decaying reality which is itself irredeemable or moribund. (This has even got itself a label: the aesthetics of ruin.) This is enjoyable, but thin; it does not speak to the drive within the human heart to be redeemed, or to redeem others.

I would like to find a way to combine the Old School emphasis on emergent narrative with the Tolkienian answers to the three questions posited above. I would like to design a game that is about redemption, or salvation, but that does so in a way that avoids railroading and predetermined narrative or plot. And I would like to do it in such a way that it makes use of the insights developed in the laboratory of OSR gaming. I have written various posts on this theme in the last couple of years, and have now collected them under the label of the Paladin Project. This can be considered a statement, or manifesto: expect more concrete details in the coming months. 

The Quadrants of Modern Fantasy

An entertaining recent episode of Geek's Guide to the Galaxy brought up the question of how to distinguish the genre of sword & sorcery from epic (or high) fantasy. I am a sucker for this kind of discussion, and I liked the answers offered, particularly the shorthand of 'If it reminds you of Conan the Barbarian, it's sword & sorcery, and if it reminds you of The Lord of the Rings, it's epic fantasy.' The problem with this definition of course is that there are lots of fantasy books that remind you of neither (Perdido Street Station, A Song of Ice and Fire, Little, Big) and lots that remind you of both (The Wizard Knight, Wizard's First Rule). And it also relies of course on received ideas about genre that may not be accurate. There are probably not many fantasy fans who have not read The Lord of the Rings but there will be many who have not read the Conan stories, or read them very deeply, and therefore form an impression of what they are like from cliche and hearsay. 

And that's of course to set to one side the existence of other subgenres - sword & sandal; science fantasy; low fantasy; etc. - which may or may not fall outside of this rubric altogether.

Entirely as a way of encouraging debate about this Extremely Important Issue, I would like to propose an alternative model for classifying fantasy fiction that is slightly more abstract. Here, the aim is not to rigidly box off individual works into neat categories, but rather to locate them thematically in such a way that no appeal needs to be made to specific genre furniture (such as that sword & sorcery books tend to treat magic as suspect and dangerous; that sword & sorcery books tend to have anti-heroes; that high fantasy books tend to involve saving the world; and so on), which always have so many exceptions that they are pointless in defining categories.

My proposal then is that the modern fantasy genre can be divided into four quadrants, reflecting two broad axes that cut across the field and which seem to me to be important.

The first of these axes concerns the locus of the fiction: is it concerned with the fate of the individual or the world? I don't mean by this that the action is focused on one particular viewpoint character or incorporates many. Rather, I mean that there are some books that are concerned with a particular individual's (or set of individuals') struggle to find his own place in the world, and some books that are chiefly concerned with the fate of something much bigger - society, civilisation, the world itself - that tends to occupy the attention of the protagonist, 

And the second of these axes concerns what we'll call eschatology. Is there considered to be a final doom of the world, whether that is just something which is possible, or inevitable? Or is the world one of open historicity without a final cause or end? Does it just go on and on and on...?

Here, then, is a stab at plotting major fantasy works as follows:

Yes, yes, I know - Malazan Book of the Fallen. This me after I'd screenshotted the chart. What I'd like to focus on here is that this seems to group fantasy fiction in a way that does not do an injustice to important existing intuitions about what belongs where, but which also does not (I think) dwell too much on superficialities or tropes. Rather, it directs attention to certain themes which seem to my eye to transcend distinctions about substance (In Book X technology is vaguely medieval whereas in Book Y there are spaceships, etc.), and which rather concern genuine philosophical differences. For instance, it seems to me to matter that in the Bas Lag books the word as such will not 'end', whereas in The Lord of the Rings, it might, or indeed, in the fullness of time, will. And this matters much more than, say, the distinction that in the Bas Lag books technology has advanced to the steam age whereas in LOTR it has not.

You may now quibble with the existence of the axes, the places I have located the various works, and the purpose of the entire project, in the comments. 

All Work and No Play Makes Noisms a [Insert Insult of Choice Here]

For the past six weeks, this blog has lain in quiscence. There is a simple reason for this: I had too much going on. What I learned this summer was that there is only so long that one can maintain a 'proper' career, devote time to one's kids, run in effect two micro-businesses (my various RPG ventures, and another separate unrelated one), and keep up with the dramas that can arise in one's family and personal life, before something gives. At a certain point, in the same way that one's body under hardship focuses its energies on core functions, I found that my mind was taking a ruthless approach to making distinctions between necessary and unnecessary tasks. And posting here at Monsters & Manuals, regrettably, found itself in the category of 'Unnecessary Tasks'. 

The 'Necessary Tasks' column has, however, now thankfully had a large number of entries crossed out, and I find myself, like some previously hibernating animal, emerging from darkness into sunlight. I am a bit dazed and confused. But I also feel reinvigorated and full of ideas. And this is at least in part because I have discovered - this is likely also true of you, if you are reading this - that the imaginative, escapist aspect of the tabletop roleplaying hobby is not just a nice luxury but actually meets an important need of some kind that lies deep in my character.

There is an irony, here, in other words: for all that writing this blog was for some time 'unnecessary' in terms of immediate and pressing goals, it was connected to something that is actually very necessary in managing my stress levels - i.e. neckbeard elfgames. It is Important with a capital 'I' that I have imaginative outlets. If I don't, I become grumpy, short-tempered and boring. (Okay, okay, even more grumpy, short-tempered and boring.) Worse, I feel angsty and unfulfilled, as though there is a caged animal inside me that, in its frustration at not being allowed out, is beginning to attack its own cage with teeth and claws.

I can't explain why this is or why it is that I feel this way while others may get the same feeling from watching films or TV or playing video games or watching/playing sports or knitting or whatever else it might be. But I do feel this way and recognise it as a significant feature of my personality that will not change. 

In the forthcoming days and weeks, I intend to get back to a proper pattern of regular, two-or-three-times-a-week blogging. I also intend to get back to producing actual material for future releases. And I also have exciting news about forthcoming publication(s). But in the meantime, it's nice to be back - if anybody is still reading, of course! 

The 'I Want' PC

Readers who do not live in the dank earth beneath rocks with only woodlice and earthworms for company will no doubt have heard of something called K-Pop Demon Hunters. If you haven't heard of it: now you have, and the title is essentially everything you need to know. It's about K-Pop Demon Hunters - trust me, you now don't have to watch it.

The silver lining in the cloud that is having K-Pop Demon Hunters-obsessed children is that the songs are actually pretty catchy and well-executed, even if the lyrics are cringe-inducing doggerel ('Heels, nails, blade, mascara/Fit check for my napalm era/Need to beat my face, make it cute and savage/Mirror, mirror on my phone, who's the baddest?', indeed). And the soundtrack does have one bona fide banger of an 'I Want' Song: the uplifting, Let-It-Go-beating, every-local-grab-a-granny-nightclub-in-the-country-will-be-playing-this-for-years anthem, Golden. 

If you're wondering what an 'I Want' song is, it's the phrase used to describe the songs that basically all musicals have these days, in which the main character (typically a Disney princess) gives vent to her special snowflake feelings and proclaims the desire to escape social expectation/veer from the path laid out before her/find her true self/break free from an overbearing parent/etc. Prominent examples would include:

This species of song, and its role in the films in which it appears, is easily lampooned, but it is important to remember that everybody is young once, and it would be concerning to inhabit a world in which young people are not moved by the theme of 'I Want' songs. This is a necessary part of adolescence: feeling as though one is misunderstood, as though one has a special calling in life, and as though one is destined to do amazing things. What a sad indictment of the culture it would be if such songs did not exist.

For a long time, RPG culture has tilted in the direction of what I will call the 'I Want' PC, no doubt because this speaks to the adolescent craving to be special and because adolescents (and permament adolescents, let's face it) are the core audience for table top RPGs. I can well remember understanding, even as a 13-year-old, that my own instincts and feeling were being manipulated by the game designers in the extensive chargen options they laid before me so as to create my own, uniquely interesting and special, tiefling/werewolf/turtle-man fighter-mage with glaive proficiency and the curse of the bard's tongue. I recognised that this was manipulative even as I revelled in it; a very great deal of the fun that my friends and I got out of, say, Shadowrun or Werewolf: The Apocalypse or Cyberpunk 2020 was the process of simply making up characters.

A good 'I Want' PC should have the following characteristics:

1 - He or she should be wrestling with inner demons - and he or she must be driven by this sense of turmoil in the direction of adventure, preferably reluctantly. The K-Pop Demon Hunters iteration of this is that the main character, Rumi, is herself half-demon and gradually transforming into one; I have only caught snippets of the things because I find the experience of watching the film to be almost physically painful, but I understand this somehow gets resolved. See also: Elsa from Frozen, who can't control her ice magic powers; Ariel from The Little Mermaid, who wants to be human; Luke Skywalker, who wants to get out of Tatooine, etc. 

2 - He or she should be a misfit and set apart from society, preferably having been bullied or ostracised for some reason. Think Elphaba from Wicked with her green skin, Belle from Beauty & The Beast and her obsession with books, Harry Potter and his upbringing with the Dursleys, and so on. 

3 - He or she should have a special gift or blessing that makes for genuine superiority over the hoi polloi. It is no good wrestling with inner demons and being a misfit if one is not a misunderstood genius of some kind to compensate. Hence Harry Potter is actually the chosen one, Elsa is actually a demigod-like ice sorceress, Luke Skywalker is actually a Jedi and can use the Force, Moana is actually a blessed navigator, and so on.

Not all 'I Want' characters have all three of these characteristics but an 'I Want' PC really should. And it is fairly straightforward to make up some tables to supply them. Here is a 1d8 one, but you could easily expand it to 1d30, 1d100, etc. with more detailed rows:

1d8	Inner demons	Misfit because…	Special gift
1	Actually has an inner demon	Is especially ugly or in some other way repellent	Can manipulate one of the elements
2	Wants to be physically different in some way	Has very distinctively coloured skin or some other unusual physical feature or mutation	Can always tell when somebody is lying
3	Has an uncontrollable, destructive power	Is an orphan and has been raised in unusual circumstances	Can teleport short distances
4	Was prophesied to have a vitally important life mission	Has been raised by neglectful or cruel parents or guardians	Can go invisible for short periods
5	Has a ‘dark side’ that comes out in some specified set of circumstances	Has a disability that is maligned by a misunderstanding society, such as mutism or deafness	Can fly for short periods
6	Goes through periods of debilitating depression, weakness, lethargy, etc.	Is of a different species or is a different type of entity to those in mainstream society	Has X-ray vision
7	Has an uncontrollable appetite or unrestrainable addiction	Has a strange social impairment such as an inability to lie, or smile	Is telekinetic
8	Has an arch enemy	Is the victim of strange rumours	Can breathe underwater