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Dear God! This thread... will.. not... die! HOW DO WE STOP IT?!?!?
As an aside, I once got props for using 'defenestrated' in conversation.
Gaming also taught me the word 'formication' (note: not for-N-ication...)
One of my characters once started a fight with an NPC patron by calling him "my malodorous little friend".
I just stumbled across this thread in my perusing of the forums, and it has introduced me to the word 'narthex'. On first blush it sounded like something you'd want to put to the sword :D, but a quick trip to Google and Answers.com put me right.
Doing so gave me a clearer understanding of church architecture (both external and internal - I understood 'nave' only in a general sense before now), and now I'll be able to use it to better effect within my writing and gaming. Describing that big ol' temple just got a bit easier now that I can use the right words... and isn't that what gaming is all about: trading in 'imagination fuel'?
D&D has long made a practice of the evocative use of language, and I for one am happy to see Paizo continue that tradition!
Couple years later, I'm running the Kingmaker path, and I still disagree. The only reason I get these adventures is that I don't have the time to make my own. So often I rush to a session with little but some of the monsters strategies, a hook, and some general layout in my mind. I use the italicized descriptions to describe what the room looks. Still bugs me when 3 out of 4 of my players (and often myself) have no idea what several of the words in the description mean.
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Hey hanexs, welcome back. You know this thread has entered Paizo lore and urban legend by now right? Fun to see some thread necromancy again - and by the OP of all people - are you sure you want to reopen this can of (age of) worms? ...
Any specific examples from Kingmaker? I'm planning on running it, and haven't noticed anything that's stood out at me as too archaic or obscure in the read aloud text (or elsewhere) as I do my pre-game read-throughs ... although as usual, I'm always happy to learn new words!
I know you've expressed that you don't have time for a great deal of prep, and I can't remember whether you've already answered this up-thread, but you do at least find time to read the adventure once before you run it don't you?
Have you seen the GMG? It has a whole page of these splendid fellows in amongst its many gems.
Rich
And welcome back Hanexs, this thread has to be one of my favourites and a very interesting debate.
Any specific examples from Kingmaker? I'm planning on running it, and haven't noticed anything that's stood out at me as too archaic or obscure in the read aloud text (or elsewhere) as I do my pre-game read-throughs ... although as usual, I'm always happy to learn new words!
I can't say I have stumbled upon unknown words either, and I'm not a native english speaker... Examples, please?
Oh I haven’t received Pett’s adventure (yet), so… But this thread’s point isn’t really to list “big words” used by such and such author, is it?
Anyway, as a foreign speaker, I HAVE to modify read-aloud texts. But it doesn’t mean that I shy away from using rare, technical or obscure words when needed, quite the contrary in fact.
IMHO, exotic words help to create an exotic atmosphere and to keep dullness out. In a way, they let the players feel that they aren’t in Kansas anymore. Some of them even use such language as a character gimmick (for example, one of them plays a prideful young wizard who got into the habit of making pretentious and emphatic sentences).
I am a lawyer. I am used to get exactly the right word to get across my meaning in a concise and precise manner. It may happen that I have (once) to explain the meaning of a word to a player, but it isn’t really a big deal. I don’t feel like patronizing while doing it, and everybody is better off for that. Using the right word for the right thing helps the players to get an exact idea of what I am describing, and prevents confusion and otherwise avoidable mistakes.
Hanexs, you said earlier that reading a module and preparing for play beforehand is something you don’t like, and that’s why you prefer ready to play scenarios. You make DMing sounds as microwave cooking (1. put away the tinfoil; 2. Ting! It’s ready!). For you, preparation time seems to be a chore, something you don’t want to do unless the very last moment.
I truly can’t understand your point on that. For my part, I love doing preparations, and often giggle to myself insanely while imagining in advance my players’ reaction to a given situation letting the creative juices flowing. I am often planning one or two adventures in advance, which lets me plant some hints, rumors or false leads foreshadowing what is to come.
IMHO, your playing experience would be greatly improved by taking at least a little time to read all of the adventure beforehand. You also said that you are used to heavily modify the adventures : it would also helps you to spot plot holes and other potential troubles well in advance, and change them at your leisure. By discovering the module at the same time as your players, you are basically putting yourself in a corner. In my experience, last ditch decisions are rarely the best ones for campaign continuity…
In some ways, DMing is akin to pleading : the best performances sounds like spur-of-the-moment, spontaneous ones, but in truth they demand quite a lot of preparation (mind you, I don't plead, but that my opinion).
Maybe it’s just that you are suffering from a mild case of DM burnout, and that you should step back for a while and let another guy take the helm. But DMing, as playing, should be a pleasure, not a chore. If you resent it, in whole or in part, something is wrong.
Wow Thread necromancy hah! Ever get reeealllly bored at work?
I definetely didn't login to complain about Pett's work, as I said somewhere upstream he's actually one of my favourite authors. We LOVED sound of a thousand screams. But sadly your right I don't have the time and did greatly suffer from DM burnout. I tried 4e, cause in a lot of ways I wanted to run a simple combat game, but I still wanted the ideas and themes to be creative complex ect. I never got that from 4e, instead we got rooms and rooms of more 1hp minions or 300HP bosses and too much of a feeling of hack and slash. On the other hand, with Dungeon - I never really had the time to "appreciate" the 5 paragraph backgrounds of something that happened 1000 years ago but has nothing to do with the adventure, or even worse, when I did appreciate the story, my players never found a way to hear it so it hardly mattered.
In the end a lot of the read alouds continue to fail my test, -- heres the test: read it to your players during an adventure. You shouldnt have to add anything else to explain the scene, you can answer questions sure, but you shouldnt have to highlight or reiterate things because if it was worded properly it you wouldnt have to.
Hanexs, you said earlier that reading a module and preparing for play beforehand is something you don’t like, and that’s why you prefer ready to play scenarios. You make DMing sounds as microwave cooking (1. put away the tinfoil; 2. Ting! It’s ready!). For you, preparation time seems to be a chore, something you don’t want to do unless the very last moment.I truly can’t understand your point on that. For my part, I love doing preparations, and often giggle to myself insanely while imagining in advance my players’ reaction to a given situation letting the creative juices flowing. I am often planning one or two adventures in advance, which lets me plant some hints, rumors or false leads foreshadowing what is to come.
I reread modules sure, but I like to have a lot of content deliverable "as is" to my players. Maps, readalouds, handouts ect should be in the form that an average player can appreciate. I much prefered simpler 8 page adventures that I could add onto then adventures where I had to reread 6 times with sticky notes all over the place just to understand what is going on.
Loving pathfinder tho! Who would have known back when this thread started the APs would grow into such an awesome product.
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I too am of the camp that supports higher vocabulary in fantasy. I was tickled by seeing that "tureen" was one of your problem words because I learned it about 25 years ago from an excellent children's movie "Flight of Dragons". I really don't think I have seen or heard it used since, but it still imprinted in my long term memory.
Oops. Someone posted a link to this in another thread, I didn't realize I was raising it from the dead.
In 2007, someone asked "How do we stop this thread???" Thread necromancy with this one seems to be more like continually modifying a flesh golem.
A tureen, you say.
The OP has a very good point. There's nothing wrong with clear, concise language. I'm shocked that he has received as much criticism as he has.
Well, it's obvious that everybody's mileage does indeed differ when it comes to "clear, concise language". For me, the word tureen is clear and concise - but then we have one at home and I'm a sucker for good porcelain in general. :)
Not knowing what marzipan is is just as sad now as it was in 2007.
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You know what I do when I come across a word I don't know?
I do as my mommy told me, "Look it up in the dictionary!"
Nowadays, I can just say, "OK, Google, define [INSERT WORD]."
It is not difficult.
You know what I do when I come across a word I don't know?
I do as my mommy told me, "Look it up in the dictionary!"Nowadays, I can just say, "OK, Google, define [INSERT WORD]."
It is not difficult.
Yup. And the advantage to using an app for that, is that the app will often pronounce the word aloud for you as well- since if you've never encountered a word, there's a reasonable chance that you've also never heard the word spoken aloud. Most people's reading vocabulary is larger than their speaking vocabulary, so even a well-read person may not know how a word is pronounced.
...At this point, the thread necro-ing has just gotten funny.