I think eastern-european/slav accents would fit the bill in this case.
Plenty of people recommended polka music in the kingmaker music thread.
In my portion of the "Prodigal Sons" arc, I had Ollix referring to the "atrocious accent of the swamps" and I had the swamper in question speaking in a sort of Eastern European/Romany dialect.
Also, Professor Grizzlebane, the leucrotta, mentions "I hear the rounded vowels of the Kadrian court" which of course gives you hint of the Kadrian accent. I was thinking geographically that Ollix was basically speaking Hochdeutsch, given the geography and a lot of the flavor, but since I'm writing in English, I used RP/Oxford English with a few archaisms to model this.
I will also very freely admit that Professor Grizzlebane has a lot of Henry Higgins in him, including diction, personality, and his ear for accents, mixed with a bit of The Joker, so about 80% Rex Harrison and 20% Mark Hamill would give you the voice I was hearing in my head and tried to put down on the page.
Brevoy is undoubtedly eastern European/Slavic. Anything from Polish to Czech (or Russian if it's more familiar for you) should work.
The River Kingdoms are more of a hodgepodge. Since my characters haven't been interacting with them yet, I haven't had to fire up an accent, but I would say anything goes. It is very diverse.
This might not be on topic, but what about Taldan (Common)? And do Rostlanders speak a different accented Taldan than more cosmopolitan ones? I'm thinking that the Restovan and Mivonese (Mivan? Mivonian? Mivonic?) swordlords consider themselves Taldan with a capital T, trying very hard to emulate more "cosmopolitan" speech and customs (and "true" Taldans find them rather annoying).
EDIT: While the common Rostlander speak a kind of Common-Hallit mix.
Polish for Brevoy, and Pottsylvanian for the Stolen Lands is the obvious answer.
It is a bit... Interesting, taking into account that Polish "lodówka" (pronounced lodoovka) means icebox.
On the other hand, Orlovsky is valid Polish surname while Lebeda could be if writen as Lebieda.
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Polish for Brevoy, and Pottsylvanian for the Stolen Lands is the obvious answer.
I'm going for a more Newfie/PIE accent for Brevoy, and Upstate Maine for the Stolen Lands, with Pitax having a sort of Bostonian thing going.
What is "Pottsylvanian"? Also, what is a " Newfie/PIE" accent?
Thanks everyone! Very helpful.
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This might not be on topic, but what about Taldan (Common)? And do Rostlanders speak a different accented Taldan than more cosmopolitan ones? I'm thinking that the Restovan and Mivonese (Mivan? Mivonian? Mivonic?) swordlords consider themselves Taldan with a capital T, trying very hard to emulate more "cosmopolitan" speech and customs (and "true" Taldans find them rather annoying).
EDIT: While the common Rostlander speak a kind of Common-Hallit mix.
I'm curious of this too. What accent would best emulate the Taldan language?
Excellent suggestions! Hochdeutsch I can do.
My only worry with using a slavic accent is distinguishing it from the varisian accent I need to use (strongish varisian presence in my game). Any suggestions?
From the names in the Campaign Setting, I imagine Taldan to be some sort of Romance language, since the names seems to be Late Roman. But since the Taldan Empire spans a silly amount of time, I imagine Taldan Accents to be rather different. For example, the Rostlandic accent could be like early French, while southern Taldan could be more like Spanish. Of course, since the evolution of languages seldom is a priority in world creation, I think it's really up to each GM.
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I think I'm going with this accent line-up...
Brevic=Polish
River Kingdoms=Hodge-podge of polish/austrian with nobility aspousing more standard Upper Class Brittish
Taldorian=english in it's many forms (London, Cockney, Provincial English, British RP as well as irish, scottish, and welsh)
Galt=irish and welch with a smattering of british english
Numeria=Czech and Slovak