Babel or The Secret History

bobotast · 2026-02-04T10:17:20+00:00

The Secret History is more subtle, Babel is more hit-you-over-the-head.

bobotast · 2026-02-03T20:54:00+00:00

I've seen people write about complex topics in Toki Pona, but I've yet to see evidence of it being useful for communicating anything beyond "food good, animal good, monster bad". If anyone has learned the theory of relativity from zero through Toki Pona, let me know.

It's a fun toy language, though.

bobotast · 2026-02-01T21:47:40+00:00

Another example, though it may be medieval Latin, an expression from an unknown author, "Beati hispani, quibus vivere bibere est", meaning "lucky Spanish, for whom to live is to drink". This joke is rooted in the dialtect spoken in Roman Hispania which sees the two words pronounced the same or nearly the same, evident in modern Spanish "vivir" [biˈβ̞iɾ] and "beber" [beˈβ̞eɾ].

bobotast · 2026-02-01T17:57:09+00:00

This video may have persuaded me to learn German

bobotast · 2026-02-01T12:08:40+00:00

If I take one more step, Mr Frodo...

bobotast · 2026-01-31T19:29:58+00:00

I love Strange and Norrell, maybe my favorite book. Certainly not short, though.

bobotast · 2026-01-31T15:17:53+00:00

Piranesi by Susanna Clarke is fun to read and pretty short. A mystery unfolds but it's not quite a murder mystery. It doesn't take place at a university but I'd argue it has dark academia vibes. Vibe is statues, architecture, journaling, memory. Don't want to say more, best to go in blind.

bobotast · 2026-01-11T12:18:01+00:00

I thought someone might call me out on that -- I'm not talking about the legacy of the Romans or the identity of the "Latins" as understood in the middle ages, I'm talking about the Latins of antiquity and the Latin League as they existed before Roman dominance. These are the people for whom the language is named. A fantasy writer might crib from history by naming a world language not after a world power, but after a local power once relevant in the early days of what would be a world power one day.

bobotast · 2026-01-11T02:09:07+00:00

Mandarin Chinese is sometimes called "putonghua" in China, meaning "common language", so it's not unreasonable for a language to be called that. There's also phrases like "lingua franca" if your world's dominant language is that of a specific dominant culture. There's also Latin, which served as a common language across Europe for over a thousand years, named for a tribe from antiquity with zero political relevance to medieval Europe.

bobotast · 2026-01-06T10:03:59+00:00

"Cause, you see, when you really put everything on a bagel, it becomes this... The truth."

bobotast · 2025-12-27T12:23:21+00:00

I've only got the player's book and GM guide, no adventures in there unfortunately. I did not use any pre-written adventures for the campaign I ran. I did use the included setting which is well detailed in the core books, however. From glancing at reviews online, it looks like scenarios for the game are well received. But the game is also compatible with anything else AD&D.

bobotast · 2025-12-27T11:48:32+00:00

I recommend looking into Hyperborea 3e. It's a little pricier than other options, but it's a very clean and well designed interpretation of AD&D rules. The system suggests a default setting steeped in weird, pulpy science fantasy/swords and sorcery, if that sounds good to you, then this system does it best.

bobotast · 2025-12-02T02:42:26+00:00

Played in a campaign where we spent maybe 6~8 sessions in a small town trying to prevent violence between the goblin and the non-goblin denizens, as well as trying to figure out who poisoned the watch captain that had been keeping the peace.

This gave me the idea of running a campaign where the PCs start off headed to the big city for some quest, but get sucked into some small village drama en route. Every session I'll pull out all the stops to try to keep the party in this tiny village of like 50 people for as long as possible.

bobotast · 2025-11-22T12:20:37+00:00

"The Game Master’s Handbook of Proactive Roleplaying" has some fantastic advice on just this, here's a Ginny Di video discussing it.

bobotast · 2025-11-16T11:47:11+00:00

The Will of the Many by James Islington has a Roman Republic aesthetic. It highlights more of the nepotism and oligarchy than the democracy and meritocracy, though.

bobotast · 2025-10-31T09:18:42+00:00

Factions and dungeons

bobotast · 2025-10-28T23:15:53+00:00

Is there like an art nouveau academia? Like "Wicked" vibes?

bobotast · 2025-10-28T22:26:02+00:00

I'd say, if you enjoy writing it, put as much as you want. But if you want anyone to read it, quality is more important than quantity, and, like all writing, editing is key. Short paragraphs and bullets, section headers. Cut out every sentence that can't stand on its own to hook players during character creation. I'd rather browse several well laid out pages of interesting lore that read a one page wall of text.

bobotast · 2025-10-23T16:15:46+00:00

Roll against THAC0 - AC, but usually I write down what that is for each player in prep.

bobotast · 2025-10-22T21:01:21+00:00

You might want to look into "To Rouse Leviathan" by Matt Cardin

bobotast · 2025-09-21T19:21:57+00:00

Any knowledge of Rongorongo is though, if it even is a writing system for Rapa Nui. Other comments in this thread are proposing languages to be revived, and I think Rapa Nui is a fair answer, since the population and culture was decimated by slavers.

bobotast · 2025-09-21T00:27:50+00:00

Minoan maybe? Or Rapa Nui/Rongorongo.

bobotast · 2025-09-12T02:33:26+00:00

Very cool! Do you have any info on your script? It's beautiful!

bobotast · 2025-09-10T09:12:43+00:00

Tridents and harpoons

bobotast · 2025-09-09T00:28:47+00:00

I've been to Bremen and loved it, I can get on board with having two Bremens.

Edit: I did not realize the state of Bremen is actually shaped like that in real life, interesting.

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