The Failure of Imagination

For those who don't follow my writing blog The Literary Mercenary, I was out at Capricon last month like I am every February. It's a small fantasy and sci-fi con in Chicago where I volunteer to do readings, hold down a signing table, and to get on panels talking about various subjects. This year I was on a panel with Pablo Vazquez, a very chill individual and fellow RPG designer, where we talked about how the Caribbean is more than just pirates... even though that's what everyone (on the paler side of the Western world, anyway) thinks of anytime that part of the map comes up.

It's got more than gleaming beaches and palm trees, too, for those who don't know.

While the conversation on the panel went all over the place, Pablo dropped a term that I'd like to share with all my readers out there. Players and DMs alike, it's something we should all be aware of when it comes to the games we play, and the stories we tell.

The term is Failure of Imagination.

When You Don't Know What You Don't Know

For some context, Pablo was discussing how in fiction (but especially in RPGs), anytime there's an island chain you see the same set of archetypes play out time and time again. There's a pirate colony that looks like Tortuga, there's an island of cannibals, a lost ocean horror being worshiped as a god... and that's really it.

And sure, those things are interesting... but is that really the best our collective imaginations can come up with?

Shots fired, Captain... shots fired!

Now, to be clear, I'm not dissing pirates as a story element. Hell, I wrote 100 Pirates to Encounter precisely because I thought it would be a fun supplement to add a little spice to these games. However, ask yourself how many times you came across a Caribbean-style setting and found something outside this mold. An entire culture of sugarcane-harvesting halflings who replaced their ale with rum and danced on the beaches to bonfires? Pearl diving orcs whose test of manhood is racing up the side of an active volcano? Holdfasts of dwarven surfers covered in clan tattoos with seashells woven into their beards?

That last one, by the by, first came up in Do Dwarves Surf? Tips For Diversifying Non-Human Fantasy Races... and it STILL gets me hate mail and salty comments on social media whenever someone brings it up.

This goes beyond the tendency we have to put gangs of sea reavers on archipelagoes, though; it's our tendency to just make assumptions about certain locations, or particular story beats, without stopping to examine them. To pause and ask ourselves, "Is this really all we can do with this? Or can we make it different?"

Because when you start making things different, that's when your imagination really gets room to play.

Barbarians Are Vikings, Bards Are Whiny, And So On...

Nine times out of ten, whenever I run into really fiery arguments about games it's not about the mechanics... it's always about people's assumptions regarding what games are (and in a lot of opinions, what games have to be) from a flavor and story perspective.

And some of the most heated conversations I've seen have been about barbarians and bards, as well as the cultures that produce them. As an example.

For those of you not familiar with Alvin Dragonsborn, he's the crown prince of a matriarchal fantasy queendom. He's had the best teachers since he was born, he knows his courtesies, and he enjoys playing chess along with reading treatises on philosophy. But when he has a sword in his hand, the Rage boils up from within, and that's when the dragon within him wakes.

He is, in many respects, the exact opposite of what many players think of when they think of barbarian characters. Rather than being raised out in the wilds by a tribal society, brutalized from a young age and ignorant to the ways of the civilized world, he is a product of the highest levels of civilization. But does that preclude him from the well of Rage that bubbles within him, or the skill and speed he fights with? Absolutely not... but failure of imagination often leads people to declare that princes can't be barbarians because it is not something they're capable of imagining.

The same goes for bards. When a majority of players picture bards, they think of Jaskier from The Witcher. You're always in fancy performing clothes, a little foppish, constantly trying to get laid, very pretty, and sometimes useful, but outside of being a face you're not a help. However, a bard could just as easily be a bellowing half-orc drill sergeant, howling out war cries and shouting marching tunes to keep his soldiers on-task. I've played such a character, and it took most of the table hours to realize he wasn't a really crafty barbarian with an abnormal number of Knowledge skills.

As I said earlier, there is nothing wrong with going with the expected attributes of a class, or the assumptions that come with a particular type of setting. However, if you want to step outside of the usual, it sometimes pays to lean back, and give your imagination room to breathe. So the next time you think about a setting, or a character concept, push on those boundaries and see what comes out. Does the gleaming society of magic-infused technology exist in the far north, for example, making the stereotype of northmen being that they're learned and scholarly instead of brutish warriors in this setting? Do you only find dragons on volcanic islands, making those of draconic heritage more likely in such areas, driving out pirates that might try to ply their trade there? Are orcs known as traders and merchants, and goblins as tinkerers, while elves are seen as disorganized bands of raiders and gnomes are creatures of spite and malice?

There's no right way... just see which direction your imagination goes in.

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That's all for this week's Moon Pope Monday. Hopefully you found this term useful!

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