Fantasy counterpart cultures or completely original cultures

Australians?

Are you retarded? Tolkien quite literally and explicitly said that the Rohirrim were the men of Wessex plus horses. And to be honest, even the horses part is dubious; a lot of the little details seem to actually run counter to them being a horse culture; they're familiar with things like shieldwalls, and the distances theat they supposedly travel by horseback in the times claimed is clearly impossible, it's more like they're a group of people We Wuzzing as a horse culture without actually being one.

I believe there was an author who did this. Where tolkien approached his cultures from a linguistics perspective, they approached it as an anthropologist.

The end result was apparently some fucking weird cultures which no modern-day player would likely be able to relate to.

Start off with a fantasy culture counterpart then flesh it out as time goes on to make something more original.

While it will never be wholly original, a real-life counterpart can help players begin to relate and then immerse themselves a little as it reels them in deeper to the intricacies of the culture.

I do find Hobbits more relatable and three dimensional than the Home Counties English they were modeled on.

>Current fantasy is in decline because people base their settings on other fantasy settings which were based on Tolkien.
People who say this don't read current fantasy IMO.

You're on about MAR Barker I think and Tekumel, which was definitely Tolkienian in its scope and setting work (but so is e.g. Kasslyne).

Seconded.

It's extremely hard to make a completely alien culture with no basis in a real life culture, and even those that manage still have to deal with future writers/fans turning it into a fantasy counterpart culture.

The ones that manage also tend to be either mary sues or pretty dull.

>The Rohirrim were not 'mediaeval', in our sense. The styles of the Bayeux Tapestry (made in England) fit them well enough, if one remembers that the kind of tennis-nets [the] soldiers seem to have on are only a clumsy conventional sign for chain-mail of small rings

>I cannot understand why the name of a country (stated to be Elvish) should be associated with anything Germanic; still less with the only remotely similar Old Norse rann 'house', which is incidentally not at all appropriate to a still partly mobile and nomadic people of horse-breeders

>"This linguistic procedure [of using Anglo-Saxon to represent the language of Rohan] does not imply that the Rohirrim closely resembled the ancient English otherwise"

Tolkien was no doubt inspired by the peoples of Northern Europe, but only in the loosest sense

You're thinking of Tékumel by M.A.R. Baker? Empire of the Petal Throne?

> Are you retarded? Tolkien quite literally and explicitly said that the Rohirrim were the men of Wessex plus horses.
Really? Gosh, I thought he said they were Belgian, hence the trilled R's.

Counterparts are so goddamn cringe worthy.

I'd prefer entirely unique one's.

Cossacks.

Makes sense since Mordor is Turkey.

I like using and blending both.

No he didn't you speedreading faggot

"Since the Rohirrim are represented as recent comers out of the North, and users of an archaic Mannish language relatively untouched by the influence of Eldarin, I have turned their names into forms like (but not identical with) Old English. The reason for using 'Anglo-Saxon' in the nomenclature and occasional glimpses of the language of the Eorlingas – as a DEVISE of 'translation' – is given in Appendix F. From which it follows that 'Anglo-Saxon' is not only a 'fertile field', but the sole field in which to look for the origin and meaning of words or names belonging to the speech of the Mark; and also that Anglo-Saxon will not be the source of words and names in any other language [in my tales] – except for a few (all of which are explained) survivals in Hobbit-dialect derived from the region (The Vale of Anduin to the immediate north of Lórien) where that dialect of the Northmen developed its particular character. To which may be added Déagol and Sméagol, and the local names Gladden River, and the Gladden Fields, which contains glædene 'iris', in my book supposed to refer to the 'yellow flag' growing in streams and marshes. Outside this restricted field reference to Anglo-Saxon is entirely delusory.

The Instrumentality of Mankind.

>I'd prefer entirely unique one's

Like for example which one?

I go based on physiology and game mechanics. Then decide the five important things:

>how they fight
>how they pray
>how the fuck/family
>how they live
>how they trade

based on where they are, where they've been, and where they're going.

I then do a quick ~1000 word writeup, ~200 per each question, then on to the next group. That's the global type.

Once I have all of that together, I go through regions. I do some history generation using some tables I have and an excel sheet that has been macro'd to tell me what happened. I do around 1000 years of generation, pick out a few random 'milestone' historical events, and then I have the regional group.

I pick the demographics, then determine power groups, go from there. I can generate a world in about a day that's deep enough to hang a campaign on, and enjoy them. Keep them in my pocket just in case.

Fusion cultures are the objective best.

>tfw I want to run a Pokemon RP and blend in different cultures to different regions
>Kalos becomes French-Greece (Probably the easiest)
>Kanto, johto, Hoenn, and Sinnoh become England, Wales, Ireland, and Scotland respectively
>Unova is America and Egypt
>Alola is Hawaiian Vikings (mostly from the Battle Tree, the starting island's stress on the glory of battle and conflict, and the story's key plot being about the many worlds)

I think so. I remember someone describing the cutlures though as almost alien to the point where nothing made sense.

The Pirate society of peter pan. Captain Hook is an aight guy.

>Fusion cultures

I find so many people who just turns this into 'stereotypes of two cultures' and it is cringy.

Very true. When it happens it usually means "tack on accents from Y group, clothes from X group, and portray them like Z group anyway".

A mix of both. I really like cliche dwarves but hate cliche elves and orcs. I think it is more important for the culture to make sense in the world they are in rather than just making it a unique for uniqueness sake.

The former if they are being used to satirize that culture's faults, otherwise why bother?

>otherwise why bother?
because building a culture from scratch is a borderline impossible thought experiment that requires extremely detailed knowledge of anthropology, history, geography, climate et cetera? Unless you meet those qualifications, any culture you "make up" will be based on what you're familliar with: your own culture and related cultures.

>because building a culture from scratch is a borderline impossible thought experiment

It's quite easy if you break it down.

>you should still try real hard for
>>original cultures
I actually disagree, and think you should start out with elements from real cultures, and then modify them to make something original. If you're just trying for originality, you're going to unconsciously include a number of elements from the culture(s) with which you're most familiar. Knowingly mapping out cultural parallels will force you consult less familiar sources and, ironically, will lead to something deeper and more original in the end.

I didn't really describe the process m8. That sounds like effort to me.

I like original cultures inspired by real life cultures. Like the Rohirrim. But I dislike it when other fantasy races are simply analogues of real life cultures.

>Origins of the United States
At it's time it was like nothing seen in the world before, valuing justice, liberty and self reliance above all.

American Exceptionalism exists, it may not be relevant now as other nations have indeed caught up. But upon it's initial existence no other nation had done what it had.

All things espoused by the Founding Fathers, the subtle rejection of theism in favor of deism, the advancement of the scientific method, the rejection of Church/Noble dogma over the truth.

Now we watch the Europeans and general Anti-Americanism tear it down without argument, logic or evidence.

they based it on the ideas of the time which were based on antiquity
next thing you're gonna try and convince me the USSR was also original

also the dutch of all people beat you to it by like 200 years

All anglos are the same.

>implying it's not the tons of dirty money and right wing church-statism that's ruining America

I guess everyone from /pol/ gets mandatory lobotomies.

>they based it on the ideas of the time which were based on antiquity

That is a misrepresentation, many cultures have had value for certain aspects but they were never the Primary of Secondary ones, they finished someplace near the bottom far below wealth, divine right of kings, Nobelis oblige, etc.

Please see above, the Empire had far different values to those espoused in the Enlightenment and the emerging United States.

Origins of the United States, specifically.

Name Five amazing modern fantasy universe in widespread publication.

ah yes the great unique value of " we don't want to pay taxes to a guy we never see"
and as i said the dutch beat you to it by 200 years

That's right pick a side and not realize it's both in collusion trying to fuck you.

Not that guy, but though it has its roots in earlier thinkers, the idea to create a rational society was thought impossible by most everyone until the Enlightenment: that's a key point in Plato's Republic, and Machiavelli only advocates for democracy because no one can stop the mob, not that there are reasonable and free individuals.

The key problem with the Enlightenment was that they though moral progress would accompany scientific progress, and that just isn't the case. From Rousseau onwards there were plenty of good cases against the Enlightenment or that were properly critical of it, but it's only now that they're actually reaching the US in full-force. I don't think that's a bad thing though: it's important for the nation to reaffirm itself, if it really can meet the challenges and critiques that rightfully rocked Europe without following the same path.

Look at the auxiliary documents to the Founding Fathers and find out if it was just about no taxation without representation. Indeed it was a tipping point.

And the dear Dutch are far from it, still having a Royal Family. This is proof-positive that they are not, nor were they ever, greatly moved by the enlightenment.

Had you said the Boers, I would of agreed with you, as they had a lot of the qualities that would overlap with origins of the US.

I like you.

>And the dear Dutch are far from it, still having a Royal Family. This is proof-positive that they are not, nor were they ever, greatly moved by the enlightenment.

the Netherlands are only a monarchy since 1815

come to think of it , don't the swiss qualify for this ?

Alethkar, from the Stormlight Archives. Noble blood is determined by eye color, with 'bright' eyes like blue, green, being considered royal, and 'dark' eyes like brown or black being commoners.

The gender roles are interesting as well; men are expected to be illiterate but cultured warriors, while women are trained to be scholars and scribes.

The currency of the realm are fingernail sized gemstones suspended in tiny crystal balls, which usually glow with magical Stormlight (in fact they're considered suspect if they're 'dun' and don't have any Stormlight at all).

Indeed, but popular support was there. The Monarchy did not spring up overnight. The fledgling United Nations, largely thanks to George Washington, refused that line of leadership, they refuted the Monarchy, the nobility and all the trappings that went with it.

It has happened in the past, but the refutation did not come from the highest powerest in the land, they came from the middle, the upper-middle or the lower classes, never from those who had clear ability, option and reason to assume such a mantle.

>The gender roles are interesting as well; men are expected to be illiterate but cultured warriors, while women are trained to be scholars and scribes.
>Belivable

>move five goalposts
Your thing here: "five amazing modern fantasy universes in widespread publication" is not what was originally said here >Current fantasy is in decline because people base their settings on other fantasy settings which were based on Tolkien.
There is a lot of stuff published now which is not really derivative of Tolkien in terms of world, characters or even in method.

This kind of Tolkien-centric argument for fantasy as a genre is weak because 1) people making it have usually mainly read Tolkien-derivative works and use that as their basis and 2) Tolkien himself was derivative, not just taking things from mythology but drawing considerably from the works of earlier writers like William Morris. Sometimes what's considered derivative of Tolkien is functionally just a classic heroic fantasy narrative that Tolkien in no way invented.

Like when do we say current fantasy is? 2000? 2010? People have been making this argument since the 80s at least. When do we say the decline started? What specific works are we saying are based on what works which are based on Tolkien? For instance, Three Hearts and Three Lions is probably one of the single strongest influences on the traditional D&D concept of fantasy (as opposed to what you necessarily see published in prose) and it has a lot of Tolkienisms but the novella which it came from was published before any of the LotR books were. I don't actually read a ton of 'published this year' fantasy books but I've never found the Tolkien-as-origin-point a strong argument. It feels like it comes from deciding that's true and looking from Tolkien for similarities rather than trying to chart back and look at what influenced what and what came when.

"completely original cultures" don't exist and all the "original cultures" almost every time are just a mishmash of historical cultures and some random ideas
They can be good though, but originality for the sake of originality is usually a waste of time and just makes your players not be able to relate to it.

I was going to say the Dark Elves from Morrowind (considering how the other elves were clearly modelled off of cultures) but they're elves I guess

Eh, not that far from Scandinavian or Spartan cultures in certain periods. Especially if academic inclination is seen as unmanly.

Jesus just name five fucking popular book series that are recent. Why the need for all the bullshit rambling? Genuinely curious so I can have some reading material and you're just getting defensive and argumentative for no reason.

Wow so original, change historical discrimination traits a bit, change gender roles a bit, add a couple of memes, boom, fully original culture.

>point out something has nothing to do with the original argument
>you're just getting defensive and argumentative for no reason
If you're looking for recs, what kind of stuff do you like and how many years counts as recent?

could you atleast google what you're talking about before you make assumptions ?
the monarchy did sprung up overnight because it was forced on them first by napoleon and later backed by the coalition at vienna.
they had a revolution there not 10 years prior

I like counterpart cultures that blend things up. For example, perhaps there's a culture which is linguistically based on Italy, but which exists in horsey steppe country. So you have characters like Andrea Frezzi and Sir Luigi Caselli, who lead a horde of mongol-style mounted archers. And perhaps this culture has also discovered ways to communicate with an extra-planar being whom they call upon for aid, further distinguishing this culture from whatever real-life counterparts it drew inspiration from at first.

>Please see above, the Empire had far different values to those espoused in the Enlightenment and the emerging United States.
Aka anglos + a couple of enlightenment memes

That only works if there's at least some similarity to those cultures, even if it's superficial. The example you provided is retarded. A mix of the mongol horde with native american great planes would be a good example.

>unique culture

so none?

Well-studied ones, yes. If you just pick stereotypical french and attach them to stereotypical arab you'll get cringe. If you do your research and get some tengri-mongol-horsemen combined with ancient greeks in space or something, then it can be deep, relatable and novel. Creating cultures is hard, and i'd say just saying "these guys are basically hunter-gatherer ancient persians" is good enough.

Obviously you'd need to hammer it out a bit better than just "hurr, italians except they're also mongols", I just wanted to provide an example of how you could take two things, bash them together and use that as a basis for something that is new but also familiar.

I break it down into 3 tiers of style. They don't necessarily mean quality:

>works written by those who have extensive reading backgrounds, usually a background in something that comes out in their work, and an interesting twist.

You can see Tolkien's love of linguistics, Pratchett's love of history, mythology, and theology. A less known but similar writer at this level would be Glen Cook where his fantasy is informed by his military experience. Or Howard Conan and his love of ancient history.

>works written with knowledge of fantasy tropes that still show some reading outside of the genre

A Song of Ice and Fire which is fantasy mixed with European historical analogues, Gentlemen Bastards which is a mix of low fantasy and crime/pulp writing. Earthsea which is influenced by Tolkien but has heavy folklore analogues. And Amber, which is its own thing.

>Writers who read nearly all fantasy, and just build from there.

Wheel of Time, Harry Potter, Dresden Files, Kingkiller Chronicles, Nightside, Malazan Book of the Fallen, etc. These are the popular books of the day, and usually beginner tier fantasy.

Eh, I think it could work if you give a good explanation for it.
I personally think the best way for cultures is just having some random inspiration and going for it.
They may be dumb, or too historical/too artificial, but at least they would have be interesting for you to make and possibly for players to experience.

>tengri-mongol-horsemen combined with ancient greeks in space
>deep

A fantasy counterpart with original elements that are directly caused by what makes their world different from ours. This is the only true answer.

Counterpart.

"Original" cultures are always either cringy garbage and random nonsense or subconsciously counterpart cultures desperately trying to hide the fact. No exceptions.

Give me a break. It was obviously just a quick example, and i havent researched them well enough or anything. You understood the point anyway.

At what point can a fictional culture be 'original' or 'unique' enough that it is interesting before it turns into 'masturbatory trivia that only the author cares about and so alien you better turn it into a sci-fi novel'?

There's more nuance to it than I can reasonably explain in this post, but I think it's pretty interesting. The whole caste system originally arose because of a series of ancient super-weapons called Shardblades, which bond to one person and turn their eyes blue. This gives the nobles a piece of real 'evidence' that light eyes actually are superior, but also creates a narrow avenue of social mobility for any darkeyes who manage to get their hands on a Shardblade.

No easy answer for that. A fantasy culture is "unique" when it doesn't evoke feelings of recognition in the reader. However, I can't remember the last time I experienced that. Maybe Numenera, but that has the opposite problem of being so different that it no longer feels cohesive or believable.

There's no such thing as an 'original' or 'unique' culture that doesn't go full retard from square one.