AMIA ARCHIVE • View topic

Sorry if there's already this topic.

I'm curious about the trends of Amia within the younger generation, mostly within the Cordor/Bendir communities. Those because it's not a stretch to say metagaming, as it could be seen by anyone spending time there.

In game I see people saying things the younger generation says IRL, and that's fine (or is it?). I was just curious if there any other slangy terms/trends specific to Amia that I have simply overlooked! Or is there a blank slate just waiting for some trendsetters?

You're always gonna have people whose personaltiies bleed through. I do it, all the time, saying things that would be impossible for my char to say because it's a modernday humany thing.

if it really disrupts your immersion, send them a polite tell. If that doesn't work, mention it to the DMs. There should not be people running around calling themselves 'The real OG', though I have seen it, for example.

I'm curious what sort of slang you could be referring to that might rise to the level of "metagaming." Is there an example or two you could give without referring to specific incidents?

P Three wrote:

You're always gonna have people whose personaltiies bleed through. I do it, all the time, saying things that would be impossible for my char to say because it's a modernday humany thing.

Oh I do it too! I try to avoid it, but it happens.

And an example would be things like people saying: "I know, right?". That's not really slang. . . But it's a thingy that's popular to say right now. Kinda fading. But you get it. Another was "Ya dig?"

Also, my point isn't to condemn anything, I promise. What I really want to know if there is any FR or Amia specific slang that would be easily heard.

JusticeXIII wrote:

P Three wrote:

You're always gonna have people whose personaltiies bleed through. I do it, all the time, saying things that would be impossible for my char to say because it's a modernday humany thing.

Oh I do it too! I try to avoid it, but it happens.

And an example would be things like people saying: "I know, right?". That's not really slang. . . But it's a thingy that's popular to say right now. Kinda fading. But you get it. Another was "Ya dig?"

Also, my point isn't to condemn anything, I promise. What I really want to know if there is any FR or Amia specific slang that would be easily heard.

Due to the evolution of language, there's a lot of things we say that would make absolutely no sense whatsoever in a world other than ours. You just have to go with it.

Most things we say don't even make proper sense to us. Atleast that is to say we don't understand half of what we are saying.

Try and avoid acronyms and modern slang terms and you'll be alright. Or laugh comically at people who do use them beause it'd sound funny trying to say EO or TK as words themselves.

"I was a member of the TKs!"

"Who the [censored] are the ticks?"

OOhhhh!! Yes... I absolutely hate when someone is discussing coin/gold and speak of the thousands place by saying "I have 57k"

NO you dont! You have fifty seven thousand coin/gold/monties! I don't mind the number not being spelled out but please for the love of all that is holy, stop calling it "K". I also dislike calling it money. I feel like money is paper. Not a big deal but meh.... that's just me.

If I really thought about I could go on but.. I'd rather play than look for flaws

Good topic though! Curious myself.

Peace. Laters. I'm out.

MOD

666WaysToHell wrote:

"I was a member of the Tee Kays!"

"Who the [censored] are the Tee Kays?"

FIXED.

Joke aside if they do say out abbrevations you have to consider their pronunciation of it as well

And the Kilo for gold I agree on!
But when I get slapped with abbrevations I usually bounce it right back at them follwed by a question mark.

When we are at slang already.. I would like to use this chance to appeal to some players to stop using modern day internet slang in a FR medieval setting. Dafuq, OK, yo and similar.

Dead wrote:

When we are at slang already.. I would like to use this chance to appeal to some players to stop using modern day internet slang in a FR medieval setting. Dafuq, OK, yo and similar.

I agree

And when you speak drow it's (drow) hello there!
Not some vax vid za (or whatever)
I hardly ever see it I have to say but I did run into it this week.

Lord-Hadeis wrote:

Dead wrote:

When we are at slang already.. I would like to use this chance to appeal to some players to stop using modern day internet slang in a FR medieval setting. Dafuq, OK, yo and similar.

I agree

And when you speak drow it's (drow) hello there!
Not some vax vid za (or whatever)
I hardly ever see it I have to say but I did run into it this week.

IT'S VENDUI DAMMIT.

Lord-Hadeis wrote:

Dead wrote:

When we are at slang already.. I would like to use this chance to appeal to some players to stop using modern day internet slang in a FR medieval setting. Dafuq, OK, yo and similar.

I agree

And when you speak drow it's (drow) hello there!
Not some vax vid za (or whatever)
I hardly ever see it I have to say but I did run into it this week.

Well I don't have anything against actual drow words players are using.
Bel'la dos, Lolth tlu Malla, Kivvil, xas, dos and so on is good. It's canon lore. If your toon knows drow.. well.. learn it I say.

Speaking as a long time Drow player myself. Simple commonly used words or phrases are ok, but don't toss out entire lines in Drow, that is just annoying. But if you do for some reason feel the need to do that then at least give the actual English translation in brackets or something.

You might find this thread interesting Justice:

Amia Lexicon
http://www.amiaworld.net/phpBB3/viewtopic.php?f=2&t=51934

I was refering to the entire lines. If it's one or two words a sentence I can make a good guess at the meaning.

Hin-vasion...

Absolutely priceless and you know what is coming.

The Great Equalizer wrote:

Simple commonly used words or phrases are ok, but don't toss out entire lines in Drow [or Draconic, or any other language], that is just annoying. But if you do for some reason feel the need to do that then at least give the actual English translation in brackets or something.

This is highly annoying, since many characters know multiple languages. It becomes annoying for the listeners who do understand that particular language, to constantly ask for translations. It also is annoying to the speaker of said language, to constantly have to translate in tells or whatnot.

It's cute that you know the language enough, OOC, to be able to type it out. It is not cute however, to continually break immersion for translations.

I actually enjoyed it with Draconic...

Rras and Ascalon once had an entire conversation in Draconic, which I found very immersive (granted we both knew what some of the words meant and were using the same translator).

I think it really comes down to audience and player discretion.

But you never know what audience you have. Someone could be playing a SD who understands draconic and speaking in actual draconic would make it impossible for that person to understand and sending things by private message goes around the hearing distances for speak and whisper set in the game.

Sorry to say but it's just cheating.

Save for the notable fact that it is not cheating to have your character speak In Character.

You are welcome/entitled to send a tell asking them to please use the "[Drac] Yes, idiot Gnomes" format just as much as they are welcome/entitled to have simply said ICly "Axun, pothic Terunts."

If you feel your presence as a SD may be metagamed, then that comes down to a trust issue, does it not? One that can be handled in the standard way with a screenie/PM to anyone on the DM team.

Disclaimer: I'm not advocating that "draconic" and "drow" and etc. should be illegal; this is just for the sake of argument, because... well because that's just how I roll.

Rules should be clear and consistent.

1.) The official language of the server is supposed to be English. If it's ok for people to speak "draconic" and require me to send a /tell to find out what was said, why is it not ok for people to speak, say, French, call it "Cormyrian," and then expect those who want to understand it to do the same?

2.) Players aren't supposed to be expected to have access to materials outside the game in order to fully function. Why are alt-language translators excepted?

There is nothing inconsistent.

English is the base language. If asked to speak in it, honor the request through either translating or swapping to [language] "text" format. Alt-language translators are not required.

...But...

We will not waste our time or resources going after -consenting- players who use the native fantasy tongues. If a request to speak or provide translation in English is denied, please take a screenie and send it to us.

Refusing the request is the issue, not two or more people deciding to use a fantasy tongue because they enjoy the immersion of it.

Also, to clarify, Basic Common is always English.

To expand on what Hades said, Dustspray, it could evolve into metagaming. Say Joe Shadowdancer is actually spying on you and your Draconic conversation partner. As soon as his tell pops up "Hey, my character knows Draconic, but I oocly have no idea what you're saying. Could you translate?", his spying is blown.

Now, I'm aware that "[Draconic] Let us eat many elves today." could also be metagamed, but where should the line be drawn? Should we encourage the form that requires someone to find the proper translator to avoid the metagaming? Or should we encourage the form that would simply require flagging a DM?

Its also a bit of a pain if ICly your character would understand the language but you as a player might see the "language" and not know that it is draconic (or whatever else) and so not even think to find out, even if your character should know. Sure you can still send a tell asking what language it is but in a lot of cases (especially if you're spying) letting people know they are being listened to does effect what they might say and how they say it even if they don't mean to let it (and a lot of people do use that information to lightly metagame by not say things they might have.)

I never was bothered too much about asking while spying or whatever but it is a valid concern and one of many reasons why I dislike using translators for languages (that and a lot of the time them just making stuff up. and it not really being properly canonical anyway).

Of course using the [Language] style leaves a lot open to metagaming too from characters that shouldn't know the language still using the info, but I would rather take that chance than the alternative. (Plus if its actually secretive then just using a different language to guard against metagaming of the info is hardly the best option anyway.)

Well, if Metagaming is the largest complaint (and can happen either way) how would limiting someone else's RP truly make this better?

Screenshot the conversation, use a translator to figure it out later. Deciphering is fun!

666WaysToHell wrote:

Screenshot the conversation, use a translator to figure it out later. Deciphering is fun!

Except that relies on using the same translator that the people you're copying from is. They aren't all the same.

Send them a nice little tell asking what kind of translator they use?

Then you're back to my original point.

666WaysToHell wrote:

Send them a nice little tell asking what kind of translator they use?

Which is the same as asking for translation really. Also, translating later might be troublesome if something that was said would actually make spy to act right there during the conversation.

Languages are governed by PnP rules. You don't have to consent to additional PnP rules. Therefore, you do not have to acknowledge the use of nonsense languages in game, and can just pretend you understand it all. We established this quite satisfactorily some years back. As regards rules, typing [Draconic] in front of your English (let alone using made-up words) simply doesn't mean anything on Amia and is open for anyone to understand or ignore as they see fit.

I do think using anything other than English should be banned on principle, but of course it's a waste of resources to go after consenting people like Dust said. An culture of public disapproval is a much better solution. Ridicule people who speak imaginary mumbo-jumbo. Peer pressure works wonders.

It needs to be noted that the "canon" status of much of these languages is very suspect. Usually when pressed, people refer to online translators which, for their part, do not cite their sources. None of the official FR books I've come across provide any substantial vocabulary let alone information on grammar and syntax. Most of the words (including the ever-popular "Drow language") are almost certainly from unofficial sources, made-up by some freelance author or home DM. If you want to defend your use of a fantasy language, you should be prepared to show me the original source. So please, before you use some online translator, trace the publication history as completely as possible.

In all the years of playing I only had the one problem of foreigners speaking.... I don't know WTF it was but it was not English and they could speak English, it was always right before they would get into PVP that all crazy language would come out and they would also say players names in the area (we assumed to target them and lay out a battle plan)

We just started killing them as soon they started talking in non-English for "trying to casting voodoo hexes" we assume they got banned given they stopped showing up in amia. forest.

IronAngel wrote:

I do think using anything other than English should be banned on principle, but of course it's a waste of resources to go after consenting people like Dust said.

A commen agreement or ruling that it isn't allowed would be fine with me. I completely understand it's a waste of resources for DMs to keep an eye on that. But it would be a validation for when players suspect it to be used in a meta gaming or cheating manner to take some screenshots, sent them to the DM's and well... Let them sort it out to whatever conclusion they draw from it. (I imagine nothing happening till several complains from several players come in. So it won't be like shooting people for the merest amount of none English use).

I think it's more a matter of taste than an actual problem. Rules should be in place to address real problems. Peer pressure, example and public ridicule are the mechanisms of manipulating common trends in favor of good taste.

Silly nemesis. This is the internet. "Good taste" is a myth, like Bigfoot, or actual females.

Essentially, as Iron put it, it is a matter of preference.

Enforcing a rule like what you propose would be just as silly as a DM needing to be present every time a Shadow Dancer hides just to make sure there is either Cover or a Shadow. It just isn't going to happen. Some folks -may- pull some fast ones, but, they inevitably will get caught and we can count on players such as yourself to toss the spotlight on it.

This allows us to act like police only when absolutely necessary and otherwise focus our time on running plots/handling requests/giving DCs for RP. All things people generally tend to enjoy.

IronAngel wrote:

Languages are governed by PnP rules. You don't have to consent to additional PnP rules. Therefore, you do not have to acknowledge the use of nonsense languages in game, and can just pretend you understand it all. We established this quite satisfactorily some years back. As regards rules, typing [Draconic] in front of your English (let alone using made-up words) simply doesn't mean anything on Amia and is open for anyone to understand or ignore as they see fit.

Reguarding this, and I'm sure it's been brought up before, could there be a language system put in place?

JusticeXIII wrote:

Reguarding this, and I'm sure it's been brought up before, could there be a language system put in place?

I believe it was said it was cause to much lag and spam DM chat.

And simply, we don't want one. It adds nothing useful, and there's no way to incorporate the complex rules adequately. Languages require DM oversight, the crude PnP rules need to be improved upon, and there's no designated language skill in the game anyway. Furthermore, none of the in-setting languages have a complete grammar and vocabulary, so scripting an actual language translator would be impossible. Anything that isn't perfect just breaks immersion. It also adds a level of micromanagement that takes time and resources from both players and DMs for very little fun in return.

Languages are an unwieldy, crude aspect of PnP D&D that thankfully isn't incorporated into NWN. We'd only shoot ourselves in the foot if we introduced a new system.

Even if you managed to create a perfect system, the only thing you'd achieve is legitimation to shut someone out of your RP. If you want to be secretive, you can make an effort. All RP should be theoretically open to anyone present, whether they happen to have some arbitrary language token that deciphers the mumbo-jumbo on the Talk channel.

Yeah, while I'm firmly reliant on the existing conventions that one should abide by the P&P rules regarding character language use, I acknowledge how much of a pain it would be to police and how broken any "fix" would be. I do think it's poor form when people handwave perfect fluency with an obscure language with "a ___ taught me in my backstory/offscreen RP that took an indeterminate amount of time and minimal effort", and I will forever quietly rage against the number of PCs who can speak drow (especially compared to the number who speak undercommon) but what can I do? The P&P system is moronic anyway.

It does give me an appreciation for Tolkien's works seeing as he was a linguist but I wouldn't go and play those Roleplays because of that. I mean, fuck, I can't even learn Chinese to help my job, I'm not gonna learn friggin' Quenya.

Loo.

Scree.

Waaah.

IronAngel wrote:

And simply, we don't want one. It adds nothing useful, and there's no way to incorporate the complex rules adequately. Languages require DM oversight, the crude PnP rules need to be improved upon, and there's no designated language skill in the game anyway. Furthermore, none of the in-setting languages have a complete grammar and vocabulary, so scripting an actual language translator would be impossible. Anything that isn't perfect just breaks immersion. It also adds a level of micromanagement that takes time and resources from both players and DMs for very little fun in return.

Languages are an unwieldy, crude aspect of PnP D&D that thankfully isn't incorporated into NWN. We'd only shoot ourselves in the foot if we introduced a new system.

Even if you managed to create a perfect system, the only thing you'd achieve is legitimation to shut someone out of your RP. If you want to be secretive, you can make an effort. All RP should be theoretically open to anyone present, whether they happen to have some arbitrary language token that deciphers the mumbo-jumbo on the Talk channel.

A lot of this sounds more like personal opinion. However, if it was decided no language system would be put into place, I'm not going to argue it. I was merely curious.

Of course it's personal opinion. What's wrong with personal opinion?

Anyways, I agree; a bad language system would be way worse than no language system.

Liz wrote:

Of course it's personal opinion. What's wrong with personal opinion?

Anyways, I agree; a bad language system would be way worse than no language system.

Nothing of course. I was just asking if one could be put into place. Not an opinion on what may or may not happen with it.

I think it's more that this was discussed, years and years ago when Iron was still a DM, and it was voted down fairly unanimously.

I know it's come up more than a few times in the years I've been here, but most people are just like 'Eh, whatever".

Amia slang/trends

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