I think we've all thought about this, even if we haven't admitted it, or been in a group that doesn't lend itself to expressing it openly.
"Bastard" is one that the genre almost seems to demand, and it's one of the few contexts where the word has any weight as an insult, rather than being prefixed with "magnificent" and used as backhanded praise.
Meanwhile, an NPC in a published adventure dropping Samuel L. Jackson's trademark (regardless of part of speech) would completely take me out of it. It would clash with the tone almost as badly as a catfolk wizard saying "intredasting."
So what are your thoughts on where to draw the line? And are there any workarounds you've had to devise that you'd like to share?
Note: If you need to illustrate a point (and not just be juvenile for the sake of juvenility), the filter doesn't recognize dìäcrítîcål mårks. Do with that knowledge what you will.
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By the Nine Hells!
Baator's Blade
Gods be damned!
Thor's hammer (God's weapon; Sarenrae's Scimitar, son, what do you think you're doing?) works really well as a replacement for anytime you'd use Jesus christ as a swear word.
And, because I think it's hilarious, do what the British did to the Dutch, and turn your least favorite country's name into a word for bad things.
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No fantasy laguages are English (or any Earth tongue) including common. Hence the words used communicate idiomatically not literal words. Speaking professorial denotes education speaking crassly dentoes colorful metaphors.
By the twenty-seven planes!
[Deity]'s beard!
[Deity] be damned!
Knife-ear!
Green-skinned rapist!
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Depends on the style of the fantasy. What works in Game of Thrones would seem out of place in Lord of the Rings.
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Why you scruffy looking nerfherder!
I use Hells instead of Hell usually. Except a recent example from one of my games "Hell of a thing to do..." Singular still makes sense then. There are nine layers in Pathfinder which can lead to curses like "To the Ninth!" or "Nine Hells." If they're unafraid of offending Hell: "Asmodeus' fiery balls!"
Some fun can be had with the Abyss too. The difference between Daemons and Demons is probably over the head of most folk so people would default to Demons if they don't want to disparage Hell.
"Demons take you!"
"Damn you to the deepest layer of the Abyss!"
"May Dagon devour you"
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I have no problem with the classic four-letter words (or Samuel L MF'ing Jackson's favorite twelve-letter word), or random thefts of words from other media, like Frakk or Frell.
I would assume any language would have its fair share of, shall we say, base, vulgar words. And sometimes, really, nothing sums up a situation as well as a good old-fashioned 'Aw, s**t'.
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I'm pretty sure the implication that one has intercourse with one's mother is still a pretty strong insult in most fantasy settings.
By [so-and-so]'s Beard is usually a good one
Meanwhile, an NPC in a published adventure dropping Samuel L. Jackson's trademark (regardless of part of speech) would completely take me out of it. It would clash with the tone almost as badly as a catfolk wizard saying "intredasting."
I think this says more about you and/or your group than it does about the game.
Published adventures are held to the standard that they need to be sold. Even Way of the Wicked made the point that, although the characters are meant to be evil, they're still meant generally to be PG-rated evil (I think the example used was Darth Vader). If it were a full-on carpet bombing of profanity and obscenity, a lot of game stores wouldn't touch it, or even allow it to be played in the store.
Similarly, the classic pulp fiction on which D&D is based had to be published, and in a much more puritanical age. So actual swearing was forbidden, but it was perfectly acceptable for the Grey Mouser to say "By Mog!" -- similarly, the Grey Mouser had sex with women, but never on "camera."
If that's the feel you're going for, then obviously the models are the pulps -- Conan swears "by Crom" about every other paragraph. ("By Crom, yin, if you don't get under way, I'll drench this galley in the blood of its crew!") But if you're going for a different feel, then it depends on the feel you're going for. A modern naval NCO or even officer would probably not have used that threat, but there would probably have been at least one four-letter word in the suggestion.
Mother's milk in a cup.
I generally don't worry too much about "sounding fantasy". We're already speaking in English, when the characters are actually speaking Common, so I don't worry too much about swears that "fit" fantasy unless it's a specific cultural reference. I'll slip every once in awhile, though...
"Jesus Christ!!! I have no idea who that is, but for some reason that seemed like that right name to shout in the moment!"
Some fun Golarion-specific ones I came up with:
"Great Cayden's C**k!"
"Sweet Sarenrae's S****h!"
The F word has a long and distinguished history dating back until at least 1475 and probably earlier. Therefore I feel like it fits into largely medieval and renaissance themed games like Pathfinder quite well. When playing in an venue without small children I enjoy dropping the F-Bomb in character as well as out of character.
I also feel that other socially unacceptable words can be a fun part of expressing characters in a fantasy world relatively less fettered by modern expectations of polite and politically correct behavior. For examble, the Hound in Game of Thrones has used the C word to amusing effect, and I could see a crude Fighter doing something similar. Of course stuff like this might make some players or groups uncomfortable, and for them PG rated substitutes such as swearing by the names of fantasy deities might be more acceptable.
For some reason I find the "Thor's Hammer!" one bookrat listed kind of amusing. Perhaps it is because I'm currently playing a mythic Viking with the birthmark trait and a "hammer" under his loincloth which he frequently offers to show people. He also fights with a hammer called Áshamarr (god hammer) and is protected by his the Áskettil (god helmet) and his "Ásgard shield".
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Broadly, profanity exists because certain items and concepts are reviled in society--that is, they are considered profane or unclean. This can change over time.
From an etymological standpoint, our current collection of profanity generally fall into one of the following categories:
1) References to body excretions
2) References to sex organs or sexual acts (you can potentially place the "bastard" and "son of a ..." variants in this category, too, if you think the main point is the sexual acts of the parents)
3) References to punishment by divine forces. This includes both active references ("Damn you" = "May G*$ d%&n you") and passive references ("Oh, hell").
Of these, category number 3 is the easiest to translate into other cultures, as most of the suggestions on this thread demonstrate.
Category 2 is the hardest to translate, because it really only works if sexuality is reviled in the culture. When you have deities who oversee lust and sexuality as cleric domains, it's hard to argue that sexuality is inherently profane. (E.g., if you tell a devotee of Arshea to "go f**k yourself", you'll likely get a thank you and an invitation.)
Category 1 is pretty easy to translate, and you can just transplant the common English terms. If you want to go a bit deeper, though, you can try to figure out whether bodily excretions are profane to that particular culture. (In a farming society, "s@$@" can actually be useful as fertilizer, so it might not be appropriate for a farmer character. If an alchemist can use blood and urine to make powerful extracts, would he use these words as profanity?) I have a character who uses "Dregs" and "Gristle" as "things that have no value" or "things nobody wants", so "Don't give me those dregs" or "That's just a bunch of gristle."
One nice thing about profanity overall is the meaning is usually conveyed through tone and context: You can tell when someone is cussing without understanding the language.
[A]n NPC in a published adventure dropping Samuel L. Jackson's trademark (regardless of part of speech) would completely take me out of it.
Even if that NPC were a criminal from the lower classes? I'd expect coarse and simple language from an uneducated ruffian. Now if he starts spouting "Curses! Hoisted by my own petard!" that's when I feel things have started to lose their verisimilitude.
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Personally I really like real swearing in fantasy/sci-fi. I don't mind the modified form as well, like how Battlestar Galactica used Frak, but I prefer real words. It actually makes it easier for me to relate to the characters, since it feels more real. I also follow the whole "in most cases the languages aren't going to actually be English or whatever, so this is just an approximation" idea.
There are exceptions of course, novels set in alternate histories will obviously match our languages, but may have altered swearing, like how a common curse in Kate Locke's Immortal Empires trilogy is "Albert's fangs", a reference to a deceased vampiric Prince Albert.
Likewise, sometimes the worlds don't quite match up (as in it's a more traditional fantasy setting rather than an alternate history), but the language might, because the world is almost like a parallel of ours. For example, Joe Abercrombie's The First Law trilogy (and follow up novels) take place in a world that has some pretty clear analogues to certain cultures/countries. The Union is very similar to Western Europe, Angland and the North are clearly a mix of Viking and Anglo Saxon cultures, and so on. So the swearing in that works well for me when it's familiar to me.
Probably the best example is Scott Lynch's Gentleman Bastards series. Full of swearing, the vast majority of it real world curses (with some references to the gods of the fictional setting thrown in), but it works for me, because it's what I expect to hear from these sort of characters.
In the interests of full disclosure, it may not bother me so much to start with due to the fact that I worked in hospitality for around half my teenage years, specifically in the kitchen. If I wasn't swearing like a sailor before that, believe me, I was within a few weeks of starting, and I still swear a lot today (though not so much at work, more just at home and around friends). So my own background could have a significant impact on how I view it.
Why you scruffy looking nerfherder!
why now that os most certainly rude! I DO NOT herd nerfs! I am obvioulsy a Shrubber!
oh... and NI!!!