Cliches you can't stand

[Silver2195]

I seen a lot stories about people being reincarnated as a person who was a villain or extras in what ever novel, dating game or visual novel they were playing or reading before dying which almost certainly involves the 'original plot' going off the rails and blowing up, "My life as a Villainess all routes led to doom" is but one example of many I've seen over the last few years though I will admit I yet to see a bad one of those as of yet.

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Yeah, reincarnation as an otome game villainess is a major sub-genre. I think there's a specific real otome game they're implicitly referencing (just as a lot of the video-gamey settings in other isekai, as well as the Hero and Demon King stories that came before the isekai trend, are implicitly referencing Dragon Quest), but I can't remember what it's called.

 

[SoothingCoffee]

I think there's several different types of generic isekai protagonists, but there are enough of all of them that they can be all be called generic (lots of terrible isekai out there on Narou)

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I think I might just misunderstood what "generic" means, because none of your examples feel generic to me? They fit a certain character archetype, to be sure -- but is that generic? Because at that point, everyone might as well be generic. Tanya is your generic psycho soldier. Kazuma is your generic bunny-lawyer protagonist. Edward is your generic smart shonen protagonist. Myne is your generic uplift-nerdy protagonist. Asuka is your generic tsundere. Etc etc etc. But obviously, I think, they're more than just that.

But I do get the sentiment. To me at least, Generic means an indistinctiveness -- shallow, and one note. So you're not wrong about "X is a Generic Y". Just don't agree with your examples. Redo Healer is your generic super-edge character, for example. It's just that the idea of "Generic Isekai Protagonist" in specific feels a bit odd to me. It feels too broad. It's like saying "Generic Shonen Protagonists".

Also, I disagree with Shun being your generic mary sue -- or at least, a mary sue. He's someone who got saddled with the unenviable position of being a Hero -- and immediately got fucked over by circumstances out of his hands. Things don't go his way. He's well-liked, but that's par for the course with his amiable disposition. He's naive, and the only thing driving him forward very early on was his brother's own sense of justice. Somewhat charming, honestly. I also don't think all the girls love him??? Just one, really. Well, two. That might be due to me following LN, not the WN tho.

 

[Silver2195]

I think I might just misunderstood what "generic" means, because none of your examples feel generic to me? They fit a certain character archetype, to be sure -- but is that generic? Because at that point, everyone might as well be generic. Tanya is your generic psycho soldier. Kazuma is your generic bunny-lawyer protagonist. Edward is your generic smart shonen protagonist. Myne is your generic uplift-nerdy protagonist. Asuka is your generic tsundere. Etc etc etc. But obviously, I think, they're more than just that.

But I do get the sentiment. Somewhat. Generic means to me an indistinctiveness -- boring, and shallow. Redo Healer is your generic super edgy character, for example. It's just that the idea of "Generic Isekai Protagonist" in specific feels a bit odd. It's like saying "Generic Shonen Protagonists".

Also, I disagree with Shun being your generic mary sue -- or at least, a mary sue. He's someone who got saddled with the unenviable position of being a Hero -- and immediately got fucked over by circumstances out of his hands. Things don't go his way. He's well-liked, but that's par for the course with his amiable disposition. He's naive, and the only thing driving him forward very early on was his brother's own sense of justice. Somewhat charming, honestly. I also don't think all the girls love him??? Just one, really. Well, two. That might be due to me following LN, not the WN tho.

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He'd a pretty mild example of what I'm talking about, yeah, and I did mention the naivete as a flaw. He's an OK character for his role in the story. But there is something a bit grating about the way you can divide everyone he interacts with (at least in the part I've watched up to) into people who are buddies with him because they knew him in his previous life, people who think he's cool because he's a prince who killed a dragon, assholes trying to kill him because they're jealous of him, and people magically brainwashed by the aforementioned assholes.

 

[Alane1]

I have to admit I sort of find I actually like Shun and find him to be a nice contrast to Shiraori's antics and behavior.

 

[Silver2195]

I have to admit I sort of find I actually like Shun and find him to be a nice contrast to Shiraori's antics and behavior.

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Oh yeah, the contrast with Kumoko helps make him a lot more likeable. Kumoko is more fun, but she is, as I said, a murderhobo who makes numbers go up. (To some extent this is the result of not being around anyone she can communicate with, and she has no way of knowing that being Appraised feels hostile, but she doesn't exactly go out of her way to form peaceful relationships with the other monsters, nor does she feel particularly bad about killing humans.) Shun is, as far as I can remember, consistently polite and friendly. And of course his internal monologue is very different from Kumoko's, which provides a change of pace.

 

[Comrade Future]

I would define vanilla protagonists as not having an interest or passion for anything, and dragged along for the plot.

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That's what I'm talking about - people are absolutely unremarkable.

Generic Shonen Protagonists

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With a high probability, the main anime of the Shonen genre will be a brave but not the smartest youth - a loud, noisy, hot-tempered glutton. But at the same time he is kind-hearted, friendly, courageous and purposeful.

 

[Konradleijon]

Kirito probably has more personality then most isesiki protagonists combined/ which isn't saying much.


Also another one with speculative fiction in general is assuming that our economic system will be in a non-industrialized fantasy setting or in a far future where theirs gene editing.

like the economy pre-industrialization was radical different in almost every way. Even a "normal" peasant clothes probably cost the equivalent of a five year salery because they had to be hand made from the fibers. Theirs a reason in the past most women spent most of their time knitting, weaving, spooling, erect. It was that time consuming to make clothes for just their family. A random party of murder hobos shouldn't be able to buy high quality weapons and generic armor that a black smith made for some reason. Without serious cash.

in the far future it seems weird that our economic system(s) will continue in the future like how the industrial revolution radical changed the mediaeval economy around the world.

To get on my soapbox it seems to be a element of Capitalist realism where we can't even think of another economic system

 

[Comrade Future]

Theirs a reason in the past most women spent most of their time knitting, weaving, spooling, erect. It was that time consuming to make clothes for just their family.

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A little clarification - in addition to women, there were also Professional Weavers Guilds. Of course, their products had a certain value.

As for the next remark - I think that this is more of a banal carelessness and ignorance. It is worth remembering that medieval authors describing the Trojan War endowed heroes with characters from a Chivalry Romance.

 

[Byzantine]

A random party of murder hobos shouldn't be able to buy high quality weapons and generic armor that a black smith made for some reason. Without serious cash.

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Generally the idea is that you are throwing around gold, while the D&D economy typically uses silver and copper - even fairly newbie adventurers are absurdly rich and free with their money, generally.

(See the Order of the Stick comic where they stayed at an inn and when given the price started figuring out how they could pay... before being told it was in silver, where they realized all of them had more than that as pocket change.)

 

[Konradleijon]

Generally the idea is that you are throwing around gold, while the D&D economy typically uses silver and copper - even fairly newbie adventurers are absurdly rich and free with their money, generally.

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Wow Adventures are loaded. No wonder people do the absurdly dangerous job of dungeon crawling.

Another thing I dislike is Racism and other forums of discrimination being completely over because aliens invaded or Magic's real and people can be racist to elves . Which is a idealistic version of how discrimination works

like antisemtisn is still way to common even do obviously more foreign religious and ethnic minorities where "encountered" by Christmas Europe
it's awful convenient to say racism and other systematic oppression no longer exists in a world that was much like ours.both Cthulhutech and Shadowrun dies

 

[Susano]

A little clarification - in addition to women, there were also Professional Weavers Guilds. Of course, their products had a certain value.

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Guilds, and indeed professional crafts as a whole, was usually an urban thing, though. Of course, "urban" could mean as little as 500 people in a town, but even so the vast majority of people lived in rural communities, with households indeed as mostly autarkic self-suppliers: Not just the agricultural products, also the tools, the clothes, the houses themselves were usually self-made, with help from the community for larger projects. Thus. you only really had professional crafts and guilds in town settings.

A random party of murder hobos shouldn't be able to buy high quality weapons and generic armor that a black smith made for some reason. Without serious cash.

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Well, it depends on the system/setting. In DnD, it is worth remembering that PCs are extraordinary. The vast majority of people in DnD don't even have levels, let alone anything beyond level 1 or 2. So all those super abilities and special powers PCs have, well, basically PCs in DnD are inherently special. Meanwhile, in other systems, you often do have characters start out with debts, especially fully trained mages and warriors, which would explain part of where they got the money.

And to answer your little rant about "capitalist realism", yes, you still absolutely could buy clothes, weapons, whatever, in the middle ages. Maybe not in a village, but absolutely in towns. The only really anachronistic element in DnD is the idea of the "general store" of a town. I have heard it argued before that DnD towns behave nothing like actual medieval towns, and are often set up like frontier towns of the American 19th century, stuff like mining towns etc.

 

[Arawn_Emrys]

Guilds, and indeed professional crafts as a whole, was usually an urban thing, though. Of course, "urban" could mean as little as 500 people in a town, but even so the vast majority of people lived in rural communities, with households indeed as mostly autarkic self-suppliers: Not just the agricultural products, also the tools, the clothes, the houses themselves were usually self-made, with help from the community for larger projects. Thus. you only really had professional crafts and guilds in town settings.


Well, it depends on the system/setting. In DnD, it is worth remembering that PCs are extraordinary. The vast majority of people in DnD don't even have levels, let alone anything beyond level 1 or 2. So all those super abilities and special powers PCs have, well, basically PCs in DnD are inherently special. Meanwhile, in other systems, you often do have characters start out with debts, especially fully trained mages and warriors, which would explain part of where they got the money.

And to answer your little rant about "capitalist realism", yes, you still absolutely could buy clothes, weapons, whatever, in the middle ages. Maybe not in a village, but absolutely in towns. The only really anachronistic element in DnD is the idea of the "general store" of a town. I have heard it argued before that DnD towns behave nothing like actual medieval towns, and are often set up like frontier towns of the American 19th century, stuff like mining towns etc.

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The "general store" thing is mostly a RAW conceit, if you go back and look at when they used to do REALLY detailed towns (see the old Volo's guides) there'd mostly be specialists, and maybe one guy who acts as an agent for one or more merchant concerns. And that one guy is less a "general store" and more a "exotic goods and/or stuff not obtainable locally" guy.

 

[Kadmus]

The thing is that, like, D&D is not a medieval rules system, regardless of the surface aesthetic trappings of most of the settings. Not just because, hey, none of the shit adventurers typically have was produced any earlier than the renaissance/early modern period; even the most vanilla and backwards settings have to contend with magic and real gods and so forth, not to mention animals that are more like natural disasters than anything in our reality. They also have the concept of the adventuring party baked into them - it's the core conceit of the gameline, you can't not have it included, even if only by implication - and adventurers are an enormously distorting economic force.

Lean into it! There's nothing worse than a gameline trying to play coy with its core premise. in D&D, you are a band of disproportionately powerful people, both personally and economically (and consequently, politically), and the world (and GM!) should acknowledge that.

 

[Susano]

The thing is that, like, D&D is not a medieval rules system, regardless of the surface aesthetic trappings of most of the settings.

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Forgotten Realms explicitly lists the 12th/13th centuries as the reference time period.

And then gets everything wrong about it from the start lol.
(Though, overall, still a nice setting. Better than Golarion, at least.)

 

[The Imperator]

I like Golarion's weird 14-16th century setting with a random steampunk area hidden from everyone else. It's a little bit of everything, just like IRL Earth.

 

[Susano]

I like Golarion's weird 14-16th century setting with a random steampunk area hidden from everyone else. It's a little bit of everything, just like IRL Earth.

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The idea that Golarion has any sort of reference period at all is laughable, or indeed that it has any sort of consistency. It's a bunch of poorly worked out mini-settings, each with a gimmick but little else, randomly placed next to each other on a map with no rhyme or reason. While Faerun at least tries to depict a general cultural history, how peoples and nations came to the place they are now and how they interact with each other. It get things wrong, but at least it tries, and that shows. Still a bit too "kitchen sink", but oh well, that seems to be the norm with DnD and its knockoffs...

The "general store" thing is mostly a RAW conceit, if you go back and look at when they used to do REALLY detailed towns (see the old Volo's guides) there'd mostly be specialists, and maybe one guy who acts as an agent for one or more merchant concerns. And that one guy is less a "general store" and more a "exotic goods and/or stuff not obtainable locally" guy.

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Well, that is just one aspect (though I would argue that even then, the "historical" way to buy things would be to go to guild streets and buy directly from craftsmen, who all have identical prices and are in the same part of the town because guilds). But also, like, everything else.

Faerun (especially in the Heartlands which have become, like, the Forgotten Realms setting with everything else sort of, well, forgotten) has a lot of random self-governing towns randomly placed in the wilderness. Why is the town exactly there? Why are there not further villages around it, where the soil is probably just as good? Now, if you imagine a mining boom town which of course springs up at exactly the ore deposit, that makes sense. And why is it self-governing? Why are there no, well, actual Realms in most of the "Forgotten Realms", again, especially not in the Heartlands? Again, images of the lawless frontier town. Etc etc.

Indeed, I have been reading FR sourcebooks lately, and the 2e Player's Guide to the Forgotten Realms even says that it is much like the 12th/13th centuries, and that as such, there are not many nations yet, just city states and the like - when of course, in truth it was the exact opposite way. You didn't have states, true - you didn't have a governing apparatus as such. But you did have realms, as the domains of individual rule, that spanned vast areas - especially the poorly settled areas. Indeed, where you would have city states would be the better developed parts of the continent, like Italy. So, yeah, the sign of "primitive times" was exactly you had large realms with feudal structures and not much in the way of governmental institutions. Meanwhile Forgotten Realms has city-states with little territory but indeed governmantal institutions, and tries to sell that as a mark of medieval times. It's ass-backwards.

 

[Konradleijon]

Yeah small city states and random tone that are nominally claimed by some far off king that the villagers don't really care about, is much more realistic. Speaking of DND. The way most people just worship one god and stick to them, doesn't really make sense. That's not his Polytheism works. You don't stubbornly worship the god of murder and mirth all the damm time, and spit at people that worship different gods

 

[Arawn_Emrys]

The idea that Golarion has any sort of reference period at all is laughable, or indeed that it has any sort of consistency. It's a bunch of poorly worked out mini-settings, each with a gimmick but little else, randomly placed next to each other on a map with no rhyme or reason. While Faerun at least tries to depict a general cultural history, how peoples and nations came to the place they are now and how they interact with each other. It get things wrong, but at least it tries, and that shows. Still a bit too "kitchen sink", but oh well, that seems to be the norm with DnD and its knockoffs...


Well, that is just one aspect (though I would argue that even then, the "historical" way to buy things would be to go to guild streets and buy directly from craftsmen, who all have identical prices and are in the same part of the town because guilds). But also, like, everything else.

Faerun (especially in the Heartlands which have become, like, the Forgotten Realms setting with everything else sort of, well, forgotten) has a lot of random self-governing towns randomly placed in the wilderness. Why is the town exactly there? Why are there not further villages around it, where the soil is probably just as good? Now, if you imagine a mining boom town which of course springs up at exactly the ore deposit, that makes sense. And why is it self-governing? Why are there no, well, actual Realms in most of the "Forgotten Realms", again, especially not in the Heartlands? Again, images of the lawless frontier town. Etc etc.

Indeed, I have been reading FR sourcebooks lately, and the 2e Player's Guide to the Forgotten Realms even says that it is much like the 12th/13th centuries, and that as such, there are not many nations yet, just city states and the like - when of course, in truth it was the exact opposite way. You didn't have states, true - you didn't have a governing apparatus as such. But you did have realms, as the domains of individual rule, that spanned vast areas - especially the poorly settled areas. Indeed, where you would have city states would be the better developed parts of the continent, like Italy. So, yeah, the sign of "primitive times" was exactly you had large realms with feudal structures and not much in the way of governmental institutions. Meanwhile Forgotten Realms has city-states with little territory but indeed governmantal institutions, and tries to sell that as a mark of medieval times. It's ass-backwards.

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I don't think any character of mine has ever even set foot in the Heartlands. And I've been playing in the realms since early 2e. The North, Cormyr, the Dales/Elven Court, and the Sword Coast, that was where everything happened. Except that one bit in the Bloodstone lands

 

[Susano]

I don't think any character of mine has ever even set foot in the Heartlands. And I've been playing in the realms since early 2e. The North, Cormyr, the Dales/Elven Court, and the Sword Coast, that was where everything happened. Except that one bit in the Bloodstone lands

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Well, the Sword Coast is the coast of the Heartlands. I do mean that region, though I may getting the terminology wrong?. And certainly, even before 5e shrunk everything down to there, that seems to be where the important stuff happened. All the PC games seem to be set there, for example - both Baldur's Gate and Neverwinter being cities on the Sword Coast, of course. The only exception to that rule seems indeed to be Cormyr and the Dalelands - and the Dalelands are of course much the same in that regard.

Basically, all that area is... lawless land with random self-governing towns thrown in? How does that even work? Nobody (especially not Level 20 heroes... ehem...) who would set up a realm in all that, basically, unclaimed land? Waterdeep, Neverwinter or Baldur's Gate never expanding into the "politically empty" territories? What you would expect to see is some loose feudal order, with local rulers swearing fealty to regional rulers who swear fealty to a realm's ruler. No lawless wilderness, but also none of the complicated institutions that sometimes are described in those cities. Basically, much of Faerun has actual states, but no territorial extent. When really, it should be the other way round. Err... If you get what I mean.

(Adding to that point: Lands of Intrigue has pages upon pages on the central royal council of Tethyr and what it does, but very little on local rulers and spheres of power - even when by all rights, those should matter much more. And also would probably just, purely practically, be more important to local campaigns set in the area, because you will always have to deal with a local count or baron, but rarely with the royal court. But basically, it's that same attitude again.)

And in terms of towns, well, instead of a random town here and thee, what you should instead find are tiny villages and hamlets, too tiny to appear on any map, but those indeed all over, controlled by local nobles, who may or may not in theory owe fealty to higher nobles but at the local level that hardly matters. Instead of, often, towns led by mayors as the political authority in the wilderness. As I have said, it seems to evoke rather the idea of a 19th century frontier town rather than any medieval setting which Faerun is nominally going for.

 

[Alane1]

Hmm, Baldur's Gate, Neverwinter and Waterdeep at least are coastal trading cities though of these only Neverwinter really seems to have much in the way of sizable inland territory and that at least runs up against a hostile rival state to the north and hostile orc tribes to the west in the mountains and a large swamp to the south and Baldur Gate at seems as sway over the land route trading town of Beregost which as far as I can tell was dependent on the gate for defense while waterdeep just sort of seems to be be there and a major city state for some reason.

And of course Amn is also on the sword coast if the southern part and it was a actual sizable country with multiple major and smaller settlements as well as outlying nobles holding sway over rural parts of the country.

 

[Konradleijon]

The idea that Golarion has any sort of reference period at all is laughable, or indeed that it has any sort of consistency. It's a bunch of poorly worked out mini-settings, each with a gimmick but little else, randomly placed next to each other on a map with no rhyme or reason. While Faerun at least tries to depict a general cultural history, how peoples and nations came to the place they are now and how they interact with each other. It get things wrong, but at least it tries, and that shows. Still a bit too "kitchen sink", but oh well, that seems to be the norm with DnD and its knockoffs...

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Our world features people with tech straight out of the 17 ceuntry and ultra high tech Tokyo. Amd remember globalization is a very new concept. Golarion is more detailed then one plane equals a few gimmicks that DND uses.

 

[Susano]

Our world features people with tech straight out of the 17 ceuntry and ultra high tech Tokyo. Amd remember globalization is a very new concept. Golarion is more detailed then one plane equals a few gimmicks that DND uses.

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Yes, around the world. Meanwhile, Golarion has random places that are obviously meant as mini-settings on their own right next to each other with no real interaction, no real influence on another. It feels very, very constructed (I mean, it is, obviously, as a fictional world, but you should try not to make it obvious).

And while of course there are some DnD settings that are less detailed, and indeed DnD is famous for homebrew settings that usually will indeed end up a bit simplistic, Golarion has nothing on Faerun, Greyhawk or Eberron.

 

[Reveen]

I feel like it's always a mistake for an RPG setting be trying to tie together their settings with, like, cohesive governments, national politics, and world spanning organizations. Especially when you have big power players who are objectively good by the game's system, therefore way more limited as adventuring settings. Like, it's kinda hard to cover a dynastic coup plot in the Pure Super Lawful Good Elf Kingdom.

These things work way better when the world is more fractured and chaotic, with factions or recurring characters along the alignment gradient in place of nation level players. Everything outside city walls is lawless wilds full of monsters and feuding petty lords, that good stuff.

I mean, this is how it works in the isometric games. Baldur's Gate 1 + 2 had this vibe of the settings being lawless shitshows with the powers that be only showing up to kidnap your sister and fuck you up if you get on their bad side.

 

[Konradleijon]

I feel like it's always a mistake for an RPG setting be trying to tie together their settings with, like, cohesive governments, national politics, and world spanning organizations. Especially when you have big power players who are objectively good by the game's system, therefore way more limited as adventuring settings. Like, it's kinda hard to cover a dynastic coup plot in the Pure Super Lawful Good Elf Kingdom.

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doesn't Eberron have structured kingdoms and so does Blue Rose the Role Playing Game of "romantic fantasy" based on a genre where the heros are part of a organized society instead of scrappy adventures. In BR it's expected the PCs are part of the government of Aldis. You can have different types of settings to have different types of campaigns. Through decentralized small city level governments lend themselves well to "low stakes" campaigns like stoping a village from being raided by slavers from the Underdark. "Instead of save the entire kingdom or plane from the evil cult of the Mirthful Messiahs" plus decentralization is actually more accurate to the Middle Ages with our modern conceptions of nation states being very new.

it depends how you want to play. As episodic adventures exploring the world like for a few sessions you help protect a village from slavers from the Underdark and next thing you have to prepare for a masquerade ball with royals attending and political intrigue., or with a more centralized continuing narrative. I've never played a TTRPG but I think I'd get bored of the same plot line after a few dozen 5 hour long sessions.

And with the constant raiding by Drow, Mindflayers, the evil Girth, Orcs, Gnolls, and what have you that small towns still exist in Dungons and Dragons and they are not inevitably wiped out by those sorts of fuckers. Like the bigger cities might be shit and lead by a LE tyrant but atleast his army and walls protects you from constant Goblin raids.

and small village communities in medieval Europe where sometimes lead by a mayor or wisemen instead of someone claiming nobility.

 

[RiverDelta]

"Mirthful Messiahs"

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honk HONK honk HONK honk HONK motherfuckin MIRACLES