Golarion and Russian Accents?


Lost Omens Campaign Setting General Discussion


Sooo I got a question, One of my players keeps requesting to apply there native Rusky accent, And I keep telling them... "Sorry I dont think there are a Slovak variant on humans you can play... Perhaps Wulfan if your lucky but thats more Scandinavian"
They seem to think the kellid wich I inform them... Think more of a entire ethnicity of conan the barbarian.

Anyway... I was hopeing somebody here would be able to help me pin down a slovak sounding ethnicity, They are holding my beloved kellids hostage and are prepared to f@&# with the lore of Golarion, And if you know anything about OCD I cant let this go easily.

Dark Archive

I do know that Miss Feathers speaks with an Austrian accent.

Now, to be completely honest, Golarion isn't Earth. Any resemblences of the languages or ethnicities to those on Earth are purely incidental and Common is not English.

Don't forget to have fun!


Ustalav is your best bet, I think. It's more transylvania, but I'm sure the accent could be made to work for a Russian guy. Close enough, anyway.


Irrisen is closest to russia ,or perhaps siberia I guess.The Jadwiga especially.Here is a picture.


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Brevoy


I'm honestly not quite understanding the OP's post fully: If your player is Russian with a Russian accent of English, wouldn't they be speaking in this accent all the time? Going from the post, if they used their native Russian, I don't think you would really understand anything? And then after referring to some 'Russky' accent, it is now Slovakian? I honestly have no idea what "Wolfan" is...? Anyhow, assuming you are desiring to discern which Golarion ethnicity would be more SLAVIC:

All in all, your player is probably closer to the mark.
If you consider pre-Christian Slavic tribes, 'an entire ethnicity of Conan the Barbarian' (also known as Cimmmerian) no longer seems so far out. But within what counts as the Kellid ethnicity, there is a good amount of variation.

I think if you want something closer to medieval era Slavic population, you would be good to focus on the following countries: Mendev, Brevoy, also River Kingdoms (which are rather heterogenous but would certainly have Kingdoms culturally similar to the above). These areas were apparently mostly originally inhabited by Kellids, but have Ulfen (Scandinavian analog) as well as Taldan (Mediterranean analog) settlers/traders/influence, which isn't that different from real-world eastern Slavic countries (Russia was started by a Swedish noble brought in by the local Slavic and other ethnicity tribes to rule the country better than they could). Mendev's 'native' populace seems plausibly pre-Christian Slavic (with 'traditional Druidic beliefs') and being persecuted by newcomer 'Crusaders'. Brevoy is more of a hodgepodge, but seems like it could fulfill the roll of Russia or Ukraine, certainly the Slavic-sounding names of NPCs like the House Surtova suggest that.

You can also look at Iobaria, which would indeed seem to be where Conan would live :-), but it seems like it would have a decent amount of contact with Brevoy, just with much less Taldan influence, and certainly without Taldan settlers ('traditional Druidic beliefs' seems to be the major thing here, although other Gods probably see worship as well).

Notably, many named NPCs that Paizo has published from these regions (particularly Brevoy) have clearly Slavic-derived names... That is a major clue. Paizo certainly does use such linguistic similarity for other cultures, e.g. Romance-esque for Taldan/Chelaxian, Arabic-esque for Kelesh, etc, so I don't see why not to apply it here.

Ultimately, there isn't going to be a 1:1 correlation, because any culture in the real-world is strongly shaped by political, geographical circumstances, and those are all different in Golarion. That said, I think the above countries I mentioned are all reasonable for your player's purposes. The Slavic-sounding names are practically calling out for a matching 'accent', IMHO :-)

You could also look at Irrisen, although I'm not sure if it's really meant to be Slavic like: it does have Ulfen and Hallit listed as main langauges, although I'm not sure about the basis of Hallit since most of the population is said to be either descendents of Ulfen slaves or Baba Yaga's daughters, but it's plausible there is a Kellid element as well. It mostly seems like an implementation of a Finnic folk tale vibe, but the actual Finnish people element doesn't seem as important.

Interestingly, in Galt, the town of Azurestone has NPC names and other features (sahtisauna) which seem to suggest a Finnish analog... Finnish and related people being a major tribe of what later became Russia, it seems relevant to mention here.


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Brevoy and Iobaria (east of Brevoy, just off the map), are your best bet for a Slavic region.

Grand Lodge

First thing that comes to my mind is also the Jadwiga.


I mean, two of the first npcs you meet in kingmaker are Oleg and svetlana.


When I RP a character with (my version of) an obviously earth ethnic accent I simply choose a country that hasn't been covered in our campaign yet and roll with it. I can think of no reason why Lastwall or Numeria couldn't have a Russian-sounding accent.

Liberty's Edge RPG Superstar 2013 Top 16

In Soviet Irrisen, cold catches YOU!

Also I hear Brevoy has big trouble for moose and squirrel.

Shadow Lodge

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Brevoy for Kievian Russia. Irrisin for fairy-tale Russia / Siberia.


Also, remember that all Dwarves speak with a Scottish accent... a really bad Scottish accent. Whether there's anything remotely resembling Scotland in their world or not.


It's pretty easy to come up with accents in Golarion, just match up the region you want with the appropriate region geographically on a map of Europe/Africa/Asia/Russia


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Well... shouldn't the Jadwiga have a no-kidding, learned-it-from-our-mothers, honestly-earned Russian accent? I'd be surprised if there weren't a bunch of Slavic loanwords in Irrisen dialects. The Queens and maybe even their oldest first-generation children are FROM Russia.


Yep. Irrisen all the way. Also, while Golarion is not Earth it does have very strong ties to Earth to the point where (as Evil Midnight Lurker points out) there are people, objects, and cultural aspects in Golarion that were directly transplanted from Earth. In this case, Irrisen has direct cultural ties to Earth and so is perfect for this sort of thing.

Also, may I recommend checking out the Reign of Winter Adventure Path. It is all about Irrisen, Russian fairy tales, and other Earthy Russia goodness. The other big Russia analogue in the setting is Iobaria, which is also the focus of part of the Reign of Winter AP. So definitely something worth considering.


Baba Yaga stole the name Jadwiga from a woman who was King of Poland.

King is not a typo!

Either way, What Lurks At Midnight is right, you probably can't get closer than the Jadwiga.


In our ROTRL campaign my caster uses russian phrases as the vocal component to my spells. The vocal component to the 'mount' spell is the russian equivalent of saying 'where did i leave that horse'...

I find it funny and the rest of the group enjoys it. Never gave much thought to if it would be regionally or racially appropriate.


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Everyone knows that Russian accents come from Osirion on Golarion. The Taldans have a distinct Manchurian lilt to their speech, and Varisians speak Bocce like all good moisture evaporators.


I have an NPC in my campaign that speaks with a Russian accent. The campaign is in the county of Amaans in Ustalav, but he's from the county of Varno. If I could do a half-way decent slavic accent, he'd have a slavic accent instead.

I agree with Irrisen as being a place with Russian accents.

Maybe Brevoy and the Kellids too? I don't know as much about them. Definitely Irrisen though.

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