Titles

Isolrem · Post by **Isolrem** » Sun Apr 03, 2005 10:10 pm

I understand that in the game, titles are RP information, but when can your character claim to know it.

Can, for example, when greeted by Andreas, one say, 'Andreas the High Knight of Helm? I've heard many tales about you!"?

Does a title's information have to be verbally revealed?

Levine · Post by **Levine** » Mon Apr 04, 2005 10:40 am

Correct me if I'm wrong.

Whatever you see on the help files in the game is what you -can- know without in-game RP unless you play your character as one who doesn't know what's in the help files.

-gissy

Isolrem · Post by **Isolrem** » Tue Apr 05, 2005 10:46 pm

Quite a lot of stuff in the helpfiles

A 16 year old dwarf from Mithral Hall would know the effect of every magic spell?

Argentia · Post by **Argentia** » Tue Apr 05, 2005 11:02 pm

I believe Levine refered to the "Heros" section, IE if Andreas is mentioned in the helpfile then you may choose to recognize him or not. Same with any guild heros/high knights/high priests. They are featured in the helpfiles for a reason.

Just type 'help hero' and you can read up on everyone who has submitted their biography. Some faiths do not have high priests or knights, however, and same with guilds.

Telk · Post by **Telk** » Wed Apr 06, 2005 12:03 am

She also said if you RP your character as not knowing what is in the helpfiles, like the dwarf not knowing all the spells.

Isolrem · Post by **Isolrem** » Wed Apr 06, 2005 1:26 am

i thought she meant specific RPing, dwarves would be very general. In fact hardly any char would start out at 16 and know the purpose of every spell.

But, nevertheless, I was more concerned with the title, a bit different from help files.

Isolrem · Post by **Isolrem** » Tue Apr 12, 2005 7:54 pm

that clarifies matters a lot, thanks.

Mele · Post by **Mele** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 6:55 am

Rather than make another new thread I figured I'd bump an old title thread to bring this up:

A few weeks ago, I spent thirty to fourty five minutes searching the web to find the meaning of a title. After said time I had to crunch the title into assumption to what best matched what I found, since none of it's words went directly through the translators I came upon.

Tonight, I've spent 20 minutes looking up a four word title, and have thus far only found a vague definition for one of the words.

This is incredibly frustrating to me. I'm idling my character to spend my time looking for the meaning of titles that are perhaps in a language my character has grand mastered and should know. I could have been running around finding rp, or working on a trade, or eating cereal. But instead I spent this time in another window to find translation and I really feel like it's inappropriate.

Sooo, I'm asking for some discussion here. In my opinion, the last person we make our titles for is ourselves. I mean, we know who our characters are. Titles are a way to say something to the rest of the playerbase about your character. So why would we make it so the playerbase had to work for it? If that's what we want, we can just make a title of a surname, or heck, even a lie about the character. No one said your titles have to be truth.

Elven, is an incredibly vague language to translate. There's millions of translators, millions of elven from millions of books and such. So is it, even though it takes a long time to find the meaning often, giving extra to characters? Is there some secret attraction I am missing to titles in elven? Am I just being a fussy whiner? Opinions?

Thanks!
Danica

Scylere · Post by **Scylere** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:12 am

I find it frustrating as well when I don't understand the language of the titles. Maybe the titles could be in Common and Elven? If there's room?

Gwain · Post by **Gwain** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 7:38 am

A Few solutions,

Standardise elven language for the mud and allow a page to hold translations for all to view - This might take a bit of time and be unneccesary.

Englisize all elven names, but in person use the elven names, but keep them in common for the who list.

Or create incentive to use real elven names and titles that respond to a few recognised words like "Forest Friend" "Dornail" "Forest ranger or such"

Lerytha · Post by **Lerytha** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 9:15 am

I'd say that I'm coming more along to your line of thinking, Mele. I would say though, that the attraction for elven titles is probably because they do look pretty. Maybe someone else has got a better reason, but if I was ever going to do an elven title it would because "omg, it looks purty".

I'm actually thinking, "Do we need them?"

I mean, saying "Taur'Ohtar en Khalreshaar" (Ranger of Mielikki) sounds cool, but why not just write "Ranger of Mielikki".

The idea behind titles is that, as Mele said, they are what other people know you as. The default should be in common. After all, the majority of creatures on Faerun are human. Therefore, your reputation spreads, along with your title, in common. Random Joe Bloggs in the street doesn't think of you as "Taur'Ohtar en Mielikki". He thinks of you as "oh, he's that ranger man of Mielwhatsit."

Pros and cons of the elven titles:

PRO: it shows that you have done a lot of research into your character

PRO: it creates a "mood" for the MUD, and your character

PRO: deny it or not, it does look pretty. Kinda like French, but with more apostrophes and less pronounceable.

PRO: feel free for anyone else to chip in with more PROs.

CON: it creates an instant barrier even between elven players who have the time to access a translator, and those who don't. I'm a player who wants elves to be played with at least some adherence to what they are (reverie, etc). But lets not require our new players to have to know fluent Tolkien elven!

CON: it creates a "mood" of annoyance within the MUD, where people like Mele who actually (I am, btw, impressed

) who do spend the time looking in to see what the titles mean end up being annoyed by the time they are wasting working out what it means.

CON: Elaine Cunningham, who has written the book "Evermeet" and the elf-heavy Arilyn books (and who I consider to be the goddess of all things elven), has always said she DOESN'T use elven translators. She just "makes something that sounds good". I think we need to remember that elven in Faerun is not elven in Middle Earth. If the authors of our favourite characters don't use existing elven languages, why should we?

I would lean on the side of making sure that all titles are written in English. Making titles of pseudo-Tolkien words from many different fansites across the interweb is not, imo, right.

Thanks for listening to my rather broad, sprawling input.

~Ol

Edit: to tidy up a bit and remove something that wasn't needed in the discussion.

Timaeus · Post by **Timaeus** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 2:40 pm

As far I am concerned in my roleplay and roleplay with others if someone uses words that are from some non-Forgottenkingdoms source such as the various net-elven dictionaries, then they are not speaking elven as it is in Forgotten Kingdoms universe and my elves and elvish speaking characters will not understand the terms and will say pointedly that whatever they are saying is not elvish.

Elvish in Forgottenkingdoms is what is coded when you type speak elvish. The reasons for using the coded elvish are relatively straight-forward.

1 - Forgotten Kingdoms has not officially adopted a standardized elven dictionary of words and not all players will have access to whatever resource you may find. Various players will find resources different than the ones another player may use. Thus two different elven dictionaries for a third party to hope they have found and have access to.

2 - Players whose first language is not english some times already have some difficulty with just english, adding the unrecognized, unstandardized elven words can lead to even more difficulties with the language barriers.

Nicolya · Post by **Nicolya** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 9:53 pm

Perhaps I am confused here or just simple. Why couldnt such titles, if given in Rping with others just reflect the language they are for.
So in elven you say "I am a ranger of Mielikkie (or Khalreshaar), so those who know elven know what you mean. But to those who don't know elven it just comes out sort of like all the adults from a Charlie Brown cartoon.

This way it's more inclusive, and doesnt alienate others or make them frustrated in trying to figure out what you are saying.

Harroghty · Post by **Harroghty** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 10:08 pm

Do you really have to understand them though? I mean, when it comes to writing (especially role-playing) I'm a big believer in 'style before purpose'. If they know what it means and think it suits their own character why should it really matter? It is THEIR character and this is a game based around words. The only way to improve your character --to really set it apart-- is with words. The more well-written your descriptions or esoteric your choice of words then the more interesting your character becomes. Good on them for being out there. If it really frustrates you I recommend healthy stress management solutions such as the adult beverage of your choice.

Lerytha · Post by **Lerytha** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 10:24 pm

You may a good point Harroghty, however, it is important to remember that although it is a game, it is meant to be enjoyable for everyone and encouraging to newer members. There is a definite block erected by "Taur'Ohtar en Khalreshaar" (though that really is a mild example).

I don't think anyone says using "Tel'Quessir" is wrong. But making all of your title elven is not fair. A title is meant to be as much about what the reputation of your character is, as about you. I remember when I first gave one of my characters a title with a bit of (although cliched) flare, someone called me by my title as IC knowledge. Yayness. But as I've said before in this thread, how can a human have IC knowledge of your title (which they would have) if they can't OOCly read your title. Why should IC elves be made to look "stupid" because their player doesn't OOCly understand what the title means?

This is a question really of who the title is for. You, or other people on the MUD? I prefer the latter. Yes, it is a question of style. But also a question of what can realistically be your reputation ICly. A level 10 wizard can't (they CAN, but should they?) put "Archmage" in their title without some code to back that up.

Yes, they look good. Yes, it might seem to elven players that we are victimising them. But yes, it also does serve to cause frustration amongst some elven players who can't understand that.

~Ol

Mariela · Post by **Mariela** » Tue Oct 17, 2006 11:20 pm

Okay.
I admit now that I did not read every single comment.

I agree with Mele and whomever else that said looking at the titles and seeing something in elven and spending twenty minutes to a half hour trying to figure out what "ranger of corelleon' looks like in that particular incarnation is.

I personally think the titles should be in flat out english. If you want to go ahead and translate your name and title into that long flowing name/title and have people stare at it everytime they see you, make it a last line in your description. It's a title, so everyone would know it anyways, and most of the time, it's so hard to look those things up that only the truly determined would care to.

Adopting an official translator for the MUD? Cool idea, but at the same time a bit silly. The game translates things for us if we know the language. Why should we really need to narrow down a particular translator?

Belose · Post by **Belose** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 8:56 am

I honestly think that the elvish titles are confusing, too. It doesn't tell me a thing about someone's character except that they are elvish and being OOC snotty about it. If there were a program for that could do for the elvish language like the dwarven accent does for dwarves, then it wouldn't be so bad. People who have learned elvish would be able to read it, and those who don't or can't learn it, probably wouldn't care what the title means anyway...if you get my drift. I mean like the note reading system.. if you write in a different language than common, if you don't know the language, you can't read it. Might be hard to incorporate the who list into that though....I'm not a coder... I appreciate the time and effort someone spent in doing it, and applaud what they're trying to do, but it doesn't help with actual Roleplay, I think. It reminds me a lot of what someone said in the twink threads. It's just a couple of friends getting together and doing things the rest of us don't understand, just to get one upmanship on someone. There might be just 5 or six people who actually know what it is, while all the rest are confused or ticked off because they aren't part of the circle who understand it. That's just the impression I get from Elvish titles..my opinion and not a try at starting a flame war...

Layna · Post by **Layna** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 9:22 am

The use of Elven from online translators as opposed to the in-game coded version was discussed in this thread (even though that was a result of us all going horribly off topic ^_^). It's an interesting read in which Dalvyn explicitly states the he doesn't like it. And he's the boss. *grins* And re-reading it I'm convinced by his point of view.

Dalvyn · Post by **Dalvyn** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 12:25 pm

I'm not "the boss". I would go as far as saying that there are currently no boss and that imms take important decisions collectively and unimportant ones single-handedly.

Belose wrote:I honestly think that the elvish titles are confusing, too. It doesn't tell me a thing about someone's character except that they are elvish and being OOC snotty about it. [...] I appreciate the time and effort someone spent in doing it, and applaud what they're trying to do, but it doesn't help with actual Roleplay, I think. It reminds me a lot of what someone said in the twink threads. It's just a couple of friends getting together and doing things the rest of us don't understand, just to get one upmanship on someone. There might be just 5 or six people who actually know what it is, while all the rest are confused or ticked off because they aren't part of the circle who understand it. That's just the impression I get from Elvish titles..my opinion and not a try at starting a flame war...

For the record, I completely agree with this. The bolding is mine.

Layna · Post by **Layna** » Wed Oct 18, 2006 12:30 pm

Dalvyn wrote:I'm not "the boss". I would go as far as saying that there are currently no boss and that imms take important decisions collectively and unimportant ones single-handedly.

I was being facetious. But the point still stands that the use of 'elven translator' elven was discussed and people were quite vocal about not liking it for exactly the reasons stated - it smacks of OOC 'snobbery' and elitism.

If titles are supposed to be 'common IC knowledge' I would suggest that this pretty much means they have to be in a common language. It seems pretty simple to me...

On a similar note I've sometimes spotted titles that appear to be 'in jokes' and I have to confess I'm not hugely keen on those either.