Veeky Forums in Eastern Europe/Russia

Do we have any fa/tg/entlemen from Eastern Europe?

Which systems are most common there? Which high fantasy novels and settings are popular?

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>Do we have any fa/tg/entlemen from Eastern Europe?
Quite a few. I'm from Russia myself but I've seen people from nearly every Eastern Euro country.
>Which systems are most common there?
Aside from the obvious D&D? WHFRP and Dark Heresy are popular. Freeform is as popular as any system.
>Which high fantasy novels and settings are popular?
If you haven't guessed: Warhammer. LotR, Chronicles of Amber and Witcher are equally if not more popular. People here were fans of Witcher long before the games came out, and mostly know it from the books. Out of the D&D settings, Planescape and Ravenloft are particularly beloved, aside from the obvious FR. But really, it's mostly Russian fantasy that you know nothing about, apart from maybe Night Watch. Russian fantasy tends to fall into one of three groups:
1. Slavic fantasy, with ancient Slavs as main characters and based on Slavic mythology. Tends to be low magic.
2. Planescape on acid. Usually creative, but hard to digest.
3. Urban fantasy. Basically, Night Watch is the primary example.
There's also a metric ton of comedic fantasy, but I don't read it because of how unfunny it is.

How popular in general is tabletop in Russia, do you guys even have FLGSs?

Can you always find a community of ttrpgers in any town you go to?

Isn't LARPing really, really popular in Russia?

>1. Slavic fantasy
>2. Planescape on acid
Can you offern any recommendations please? Stuff that's been translated to English.

>How popular in general is tabletop in Russia, do you guys even have FLGSs?
Eh. It's pretty normal for my generation middle class and up. In earlier generations and down the social ladder, it doesn't exist or is even considered satanic propaganda.
>do you guys even have FLGSs?
No. Hobby shops and gaming clubs are usually separate places. Most people play at home, because gaming clubs usually can't rent good premises. I got lucky, because my city's gaming club registered as a youth organization and got a room from the government in a former palace currently used by different youth clubs.
I don't know what's been translated into English and what hasn't (probably nothing has, Russian fantasy is only ever translated into German), but you can't go wrong with the most definitive series for both genres:
>Slavic fantasy
The Wolfhound
>Planescape on acid
The Keeper of Swords

>Isn't LARPing really, really popular in Russia?
It used to be absolutely crazy popular. I think it's dying now, but so is everything else.

As far as Russian fantasy goes, there are a lot of stories where the protagonist from our world is transported into a fantasy world. Don't know why this shit is so popular here.

>Don't know why this shit is so popular here
Because escaping Russia is fantasy by itself.

Forgot to answer
>Isn't LARPing really, really popular in Russia?
It is, but I have zero interest in it because a lot of the larpers are fucked up, genuinely disgusting people. You meet detached autists who commit suicide trying to transform into a lich (true story), chavs who visit the events to beat up nerds with impunity, unwashed hippies who have more STD's than China has people, and the like.

It's not fantasy though, just alternative history/wet dreaming put on paper. I want Rybachenko's books to be translated so that the world may understand what we're dealing with.

>Don't know why this shit is so popular here.
Because your average Russian thinks that the fate of Russia is extremely unfair and wants to go back in time to change it.

I swear I have seen this picture from another angle. Does anyone have source?

>The Wolfhound
Oh, shit. Isn't there a movie with the same title? Is it any good?

Yea, I remember going wtf at videos of large groups of people brawling in medieval armor.

What? They won WWII, established a global empire that rivaled the greatest power in the world, USA. And are now the fourth great power of the world alongside USA, EU and China

It's an artists rendition of the battle of grunwald. Google reverse image search for source

I'm trying to introduce a few slavic-flavour ritual spells into my games.

I know that they should be very life-imanent, a lot of singing and dancing and whatnot, with more subtle effects than a fireball or whathaveyou.

Any advice?

>They won WWII, established a global empire that rivaled the greatest power in the world, USA. And are now the fourth great power of the world alongside USA, EU and China
This is what the Russian TV says. When you live here, it sure feels like we lost WWII. And the EU is not a country.

>What? They won WWII, established a global empire that rivaled the greatest power in the world, USA. And are now the fourth great power of the world alongside USA, EU and China

The thing is that Russians historically often conflate the success of the Russian people with the Russian state in that direction. For example now many Russians think that the living standards they have a re the best possible ones Putin could ever provide them considering all the external oppressive factors on the country.

>And the EU is not a country.
good thing he said power

>The Keeper of Swords
>Reading about the author

>In 1985–1991 he wrote his first fantasy novel Hиcхoждeниe тьмы (Descent of Darkness), which consisted of two volumes: Эльфийcкий Клинoк (Elven Blade) and Чepнoe Кoпьe (Black Lance). The book was set in J. R. R. Tolkien's Middle-earth, 300 years after the War of the Ring

>Isn't there a movie with the same title?
I think it's TV series. Also, I used to think that the Witcher and the Wolfhound are the same thing.

>conflate the success of the people with the state in that direction
Come again?

He's saying people sometimes think they are better off when the state conducts successful diplomacy or war even if there is not apparent change in living standards

>Is it any good?
It's pretty awful. I'm surprised and ashamed that you know of it.

Slavic magic was verbal, not ritualistic, and it mainly involved clairvoyance and polymorph.

They would be centered around earning favor of the spirits and gods. You'd leave offerings to the river spirit so it would hide you from the sight of enemies when you are close to her domain.

the opposite actually, they think Russia as a global power must be having it bad because that's what their living standards reflect.

That's why they think as per the fate of Russia is an unfair one instead of blaming the consistently uncaring though mostly successful regimes from Ivan onwards for their plight.

there was one time that didn't happen

It's pretty bad if you like LotR. It's got planar travel, hobbit murder machines and stuff like that.

The state, the USSR, enjoyed quite a bit of success as an international superpower. The people in general meanwhile didn't enjoy much of anything, having a shit standard of living and the political freedom of shutting up and doing as they were told if they didn't want to be curb-stomped by the state. They weren't successful, their masters were.

It's the "Veeky Forums thinks that your usual low/folklore magic is some specific 'ethnic' magic" episode.

>It's got planar travel, hobbit murder machines and stuff like that.
Only in Russia...

>awful
What about the Nightwatch film, is that any good?
Viking was one of the films I was really fucking hyped about. That was a disappointment as well.

He asks about the flavor, that would be appropriate flavor. If you disagree feel free to make your proposition.

I just wanna know more about slavic folklore as it relates to how magic is shown there is all

There's also a shit movie

>They weren't successful, their masters were.
Hm, that must feel like an improvement after late Russian Empire without success in anything.

> Which systems are most common there?
From what I've seen it's mostly 5e \ Pathfinder, some Shadowrun.

> Which high fantasy novels and settings are popular?
Faerun, Eberron, Golarion, self-made settings. Rothfuss, Sanderson, Butcher, Sapkovsky.

> How popular in general is tabletop in Russia, do you guys even have FLGSs?
Not really popular albeit slowly going mainstream (due to Critical Role and like). In the capital where I happen to live there are several gaming stores (which mainly specialize in wargames) and loads of anticafes - clubs where you pay per minute and get basic snacks\tea\coffee + room with some gaming accessories like a Playstation and loads of board games.
There are also some parties on Twitch.

> Can you always find a community of ttrpgers in any town you go to?
Depends on the town. Personally I feel like they are pretty scarce everywhere except large cities.

> Isn't LARPing really, really popular in Russia?
Somewhat. Haven't tried it.

>What about the Nightwatch film, is that any good?
It's pretty cool.
>Viking was one of the films I was really fucking hyped about. That was a disappointment as well.
Watch The Last Warrior if you want to see Slavic fantasy, it's a dumb comedy, but fairly entertaining.

I am from Lithuania and games here are rare, though I have seen players of 40k RPGs

However, under USSR people had guaranteed housing (even though more often than not it was a barrack in the steppe) and guaranteed employment (even though more often than not it was picking up potatoes in Kazakhstan). A lot of people miss it, especially those who could only get a job under guaranteed employment.
Not true. There is a lot of Isekai shit, especially in fantasy for women section.

Stop pretending it's any harder than escaping any other country.

>flavor
Dildo looking totem poles and holy trees wrapped in ribbons.

Slight correction on the absolute nature of your statement:

There wasn't guaranteed employment, unemployment was criminalized. That crime was still very common (jstor.org/stable/1811163?seq=1#page_scan_tab_contents)

Also, the housing was very centralized in many regions meaning that outside of those central areas homelessness was still an issue, though it was truly far less of one than nowadays.

It is, Western companies don't hire Russians because they need to make visas for them. It's much easier to hire a Westerner who needs no visa, which is exactly what they do.

>Dildo looking totem poles
That's also appropriate for adventures in India. They are erected near temples, holy ground and alongside roads (no pun intended).

There's also books like No Time For Dragons, which are your typical power fantasy for office workers.

It is because the distance you have to travel is greater desu.

Late Russian Empire had crazy economic growth without all the wonders of Stalinism.

Start a thread on /pol/ if you want to share such revelations with us

And this is Russia's fault how exactly?

who said it was?

I didn't start this, why aren't you picking on the guy who did?

Read my post again. A lot of people would just refuse a shitty job employment center will offer them or refuse to work for ideological or religious reasons (your study is conducted by polling emigrants and those were often let out because they belonged to the latter two groups).

Countless liberals who call Russia their prison.

and you ask some guy on tg to clarify

Those are literally penises.

Exactly, it's one of the many penises of Shiva scattered all over India and Southeastern Asia. Pray to it and leave some flowers, butter and coins before it to gain good luck and prosperity.

Pole here
Warhammer Fantasy is still the king of fantasy RPGs here, although as expected stuff like D&D still have a fair playerbase. Other than that, Polish systems like Neuroshima(post-apo, Poles seem to have a thing for post-apo in general) and Wolsung(steampunk). And a little bit of everything really.
As for books and settings, other than Witcher, which is obviously very popular here, I think it's pretty much the same as everywhere, I don't think there are any settings which are particularly popular here that aren't in the west, but Poles generally seem to prefer low-medium fantasy and more gritty settings to high fantasy and noble ones. I've heard that Disc World is kind of more popular here than in other countries, but I don't know how true is that since I don't really have a comparison. It is indeed very popular here.

>Yea, I remember going wtf at videos of large groups of people brawling in medieval armor.
That's probably just historical reconstruction, people do that everywhere. It's kind of a family hobby for me, so I was doing that since I was 8.

Any news on Cyberpunk 2077 other than that it'll be at E3?

>witcher
Do you guys still use the old witcher rpg to play it? Other than the books and vidya what other stuff does Witcher have? Please don't mention the shitty show or film

>It's kind of a family hobby for me, so I was doing that since I was 8.
Tell us more about it, user. Do you have any photos to share?

Yes, it's a completely different thing.
Swole guys beating each other with metal sticks is a respected and socially accepted act, while fat guys wrapped in curtains and pretending to be elves is not.

Or maybe it was an average Warhammer LARP: photos.google.com/share/AF1QipMjiLQGt_i-Wp16o1ZLMKHUZ0dI6cz42k5kwEF7SWN2J3fgSe_9nmq8-M_VmpXXrQ?key=SFZBSEc2cEk2YmI1Sl9MUHlOVWpucjJTMzk5Nml3

>Any news on Cyberpunk 2077 other than that it'll be at E3?
Nothing I've heard of. You know, we don't really have any reason to know anything more than you do, unless someone happens to personally knows one of the devs. I don't. When CDPR decides to share anything, they share it with the whole world.
>Do you guys still use the old witcher rpg to play it?
I heard of some folks who do, but surprisingly Witcher isn't that much popular for RPGs here, despite it being generally loved. I think that for some reason people rather tend to run games with a tone heavily inspired by Witcher, but not in Witcher setting itself. Don't know why.
>Other than the books and vidya what other stuff does Witcher have? Please don't mention the shitty show or film
Pretty much just that I guess. There is a few board games and some LARPs, comic books which from what I know are just direct adaptations of books and lots of mostly crappy fanfics from Poland, Czech, Russia and probably other Slavic countries as well. I've heard that recently Sapkowski actually compiled those more high quality ones and released them.

What about qt waifus pretending to be elves?

Here's a start up of Slavic mythology.

The first two gods are twin brothers, one good and one evil.

Svarog whose domains are the sun, fire, life and craftmanship who is the chief deity who doesn't intervene into the world much.
His symbol is the Sunwheel.
His ''Golden Halls'' are pretty much paradise for good people werther they be warriors or common peasants.

Mrogon/Mokoš/Veleš is his twin equivalent.
His symbol are snakes.
Being inately greedy he stole some of the golden sand of creation from Svarog and hid it in his hollow tooth.
When Svarog used the sand to create the world the stolen sand burst out from the hollow tooth and birthed all the monsters in the world starting with snakes(dragons).
For his repeated evil behavior he ended up seaked beneath the world tree which is an oak.

Triglav/Perun (The three-headed god of lightning - which bears a startk resemblance to Hindu gods of wrath Asuras with 6 arms 3 heads and lightning powers) is the chief war god and forefather of all Slavs who lead them west into freedom (The historical Slavic leader who lead slavs into the Balkans and conquered all the way to Athens was named Son of Perun).

Magic is a power granted by either the god Svarog, gifted by Dragons who act as trial masters who grant it to the worthy of pure heart (Dragons in Slavic myths are Serpentine Lawfull Neutral beings who uphold the order of nature as apex magic predators - more like Chinese dragons), or magic is stolen rom Veleš by stabbing an oak tree in a ritual to drain his powers.

Fey are Chaotic forces of nature who will eat you if you are impolite or ignorant towards knowledge such as farming.
They like to get drunk and abduct young teen girls and boys to copulate with.

Everything unliving has a spirit that should be respected.

House spirits guard your family and bring good fortune if you make regular sacrifices (a bit of honey candy) or bring misschief if you are evil.

Cont.

Thanks for sharing. How popular is the neo-pagan movement in your country?

Werewolves are split into two kinds.
One are Cursed shapeshifting sorcerrers who are unable to revert their form.
The second are valiant warrirors who made the power their own and control it (these are the equivalent of bersekers).

Vampires are undead who were powerfull Warriors or Sorcerrers in life and refused to move on to the underworld.
They can swim through land and move through walls along with shapeshifting into beasts.
They look like the Draugur in Skyrim (which are based on the Nordic version of the vampires).
They are innately evil.

The world is split into the three realms connected by the World Tree :
>The Netherworld - the world of the afterlife where souls get either tormented or sent into the cycle of rebirth.
>The Earthly realm - our mortal world filled with beasts , men and common magic.
>The Heavenly realm where the most powerfull spirits/souls, wrathfull warriors, benevolent sorcerrers, virtous humans, gods and heavenly beasts reside.

>Outside that is the world of primal chaos and other worlds.

>Poles generally seem to prefer low-medium fantasy and more gritty settings to high fantasy and noble ones.
Based Poland

I'm pretty sure that they do historical reenactings everywhere, I've met many reenactors from all over Europe. Basically you dress in historical clothes from given period, use only utensils they had back then etc., of course as far as common sense goes and only for the duration of reenacting event. We usually also make a few battles(with real weapons, not some faggy larp swords). Events are usually made for anniversaries of important historical events, but sometimes also without any particular meaning behind them. There is a big pressure among reenactiors to be as "kosher" as possible, which means to be as historically accurate as possible, at all times. Try even hiding a coca-cola bottle inside your medieval tent or God forbid have a phone in your tunic during an event and you're going to get heavily frowned by the "serious" reenactors. To be quite honest, although most of individual reenactors are total bros(kind of weirdos often, but bros), the "community" in general is pretty toxic with lots of infighting and rows between the groups.
As for me personally, I come from a family of historians and museologists and especially my dad was always heavily into historical reenactions. We used to do mostly early medieval period, but due to problems with his spine my dad couldn't carry and wear all the heavy shit any more and had to switch to something "lighter". He also once had a few ribs broken during a battle by some Russian with a two handed axe. Shit happens. He switched to American Civil War, since he always loved this period and we're doing 14th Louisiana Infantry Regiment. He also does WW2 stuff and Cursed soldiers(and Polish underground movements in general), but since this is still a very politically touchy subject here and our views on it heavily differ I tend do avoid doing that with him, except from Warsaw Uprising stuff(which is generally important topic in my family, since my Grand-Grandmother was an Uprising veteran)

much more popular than it has any business being

Sadly it's limited to teens who LARP and listen to Scandinavian Black Metal...

Morever my society is split between the uber patriotic Chatolics and the Communists who are nostalgic about Yugoslavia.
So if i have to pick a side i'd pick the Uber Chatolics who converted the Slavic pantheon into Christian saints anyway.

St. Illiah for example is pretty much Perun.
Vesna the godess of Spring got turned into a saintess that represents virtue and purity among women.
Svarog pretty much got absorbed into being the Christian god.
Veleš and all the Dragons got turned into literaly satan.

Slavic mythology is closest to Budhist belief of the world so go and read some chink myths and see what overlaps.
Prooving further that us Slavs aren't white.

Why are you responding for me?

Hello from Donetsk! There are no game stores in our place. However, there are a few gaming clubs and at least one roleplaying game is going on in our city. I'm probably not joining it now because I have too little time and too unreliable timetable. It's going to use DnD5. I prefer other systems that are not really popular even in the US.
LARPing is popular in Russia. It was popular here too. But then the war broke out. Anyway, we still have some LARP festivals in spring and summer. TTRPGs aren't popular at all, but I've played in a few FRPGs wgen I was younger. Now I consider FRPGs unfunny waste of time. I've played a few "TTRPGs" via skype though.

>Veleš
>evil
Here he was just the god of merchants...

>god of merchants, cattle, magic trickery, darknes, monsters and evil

>typically depicted as a greedy brooding man with a big dark beard and a huge nose

because there's more than one slavic country?

I didn't know there were a lot of Croats who were sympathetic to Yugoslavia

>I didn't know there were a lot of Croats who were sympathetic to Yugoslavia

Communists remain a plight on our society and sadly recieve permanent political and financial aid by organisations funded by a certain Jewish banker who crashed the Sterling and the EUSSR bureaucrats.

We honestly need to copy the American constitution to prevent them from ever gaining power again.

>Slavic mythology is closest to Budhist belief of the world
In fact, it's the closest to the ancient North Indian mythology, which, in its turn, influenced Buddhism and Hinduism.

Does Georgia count?
Anywho, People are more into Warhammer, but fanbase isnt that large. Most popular settings are LotR and Witcher

>We honestly need to copy the American constitution to prevent them from ever gaining power again.
Full. On. Retard.
That's like saying: we need to build a system that makes power-gaming impossible. Systems cannot deliver that. Instead, GMs (aka society) need to be eternally vigilant and watch over the issue like a hen over her eggs.
But that's burdensome, it's hard work, it gets in the way of having fun, so let's design a set of complex rules that does the job for us so that we can relax and can afford to become oblivious, amirite?

Does Serbia count?

Anyway, most common stuff is standard D&D, albeit 2e era, believe it or not. Rarely do people play stuff like World of Darkness.

Oh and there's plenty of board/social games that folks play, including card games.

I

>Oh and there's plenty of board/social games that folks play, including card games.
Eh, I dont think that people here meant about backgammon, chess or domino

Gun rights and private property rights combined with castle law are the primary reason why the United States never had to deal with any more communists besides a few saboteours who incited a few workers syndicates.

A good constitution is a prequisite for a country to fend of these kinds of people.

I do agree that leaving everything to the state is bad.

But please let's not have this discussion here on Veeky Forums, this a discussion that actually belongs on /pol/.

I'm not talking about those either. I'm talking more Veeky Forums related stuff, it's just that I don't know their names since I'm an anti-social cunt who avoids leaving his home, if it's not work-related or paying the bills.

...

>United States never had to deal with any more communists
Are you blind? Do you ever watch US media? What do you think those blue-haired feminists and statue-toppling morons are? What do you think why Merkel opened the migrant floodgates? The West is infested with communists now, except their communism is neither explicit nor institutional, it's instinctual.

>But please let's not have this discussion here on Veeky Forums, this a discussion that actually belongs on /pol/.
Fair enough.

I remember that ebin story

Can not unsee man-boobs.

Slavs really are elves.

Where the hell do you live, man. Here in Novi Sad it's either 3e/Pathfinder shitfest or nothing. I've been surviving on BSG and Twilight Imperium for half a decade.

Even Daoism is closer to Slavic belief than modern Christianity or Nordcuck Neo-Paganism.

Let's get the example of trees and their attributes.

The Oak tree in Slavic folklore is associate with the god of thunder and masculine powers.

The Oak tree in Daoism is associated with lightning and Yang masculine, righteous hard energies.

The Willow tree in Slavic myth is associated with Veleš, the god of evil, trickery, snakes etc.

The Willow tree in Daoist belief is associated with Yin energies, softnes, evil, trickery...


Do you get my point?

Slavs have more in common with Chinese than they have with other ''whites''.

nice dubs

>slavic folk religion closely resembles ancient north indian mythology
>ancient north indians werethe OG aryans

and people still say slavs aren't white. the infighting amongst the children of the aryans make me sad as fuck desu, if we we could present a strong united front against our enemy the world would be a much better place

Lingas are fun. I like how the God of asceticism is also the biggest slut.

>What do you think those blue-haired feminists and statue-toppling morons are?
Hard line Liberals with the occasional Anarchist. Don't worry, confusing that for actual communists is a classic mistake.

Hey, if Shiva doesn't give a fuck about anything, of course, he some of it left to grant to his followers

>>Hard line liberals
>>Want more power to the state
>>Support the big state
>>Actually crub or regulate individual rights and try to destroy constitutional rights that prevent at tyranical government from being formed

If it breathes like a communists, if it talks like a communist and it it acts like a communist then it certainly isn't a liberal.

>Hard line Liberals with the occasional Anarchist. Don't worry, confusing that for actual communists is a classic mistake.
What do you think society would look like if they were in charge? I am telling you: German Democratic Republic.

Please fuck off to /pol/

Beograd.

Like I said in another post, I'm an anti-social cunt that barely gets out of his house.

I'd really like to play Dark Sun, Planescape, Ravenloft or maybe Warhammer Fantasy.

Never gonna happen though.

Had a chance to play some Vampire: The Masquerade once, but that fell apart because the group I was playing with was friends with my ex and once we broke up, I wasn't invited any more.

I would invite you to my group but i'm in Northern Croatia...

Good luck finding another group.

>anti-social cunt
>had a gf
does not compute

Do you have any wargaming or rpgs on the yugoslav wars?

>Do you have any wargaming or rpgs on the yugoslav wars?
Not from Balkans, but I honestly doubt anyone living there would like to reenact this shit, not in good few decades yet at least.

So, wait, shouldn't we be worrying about National Socialists, then?

there is no fucking dancing and going hakuna matata to throw fireballs in slavic folklore